Problem setting up CDROM Drive with A2091

[sim]

Help... I'm running out of ideas!

I'm trying to get an Apple 600i SCSI CDROM drive to work on my A2000 using an A2091 card, but it's constantly locking up (a2091 access light goes on full making all disk access impossible).  The CDROM drive comes up ok in all the SCSI interegation tools, and I can send it scsi direct commands to open and close, but even these will on occasion lock it up.  All this before I even mount it.  If I do mount it the icons appear in workbench, and I can open up a directory or two before it locks up again.

Is this indicative of termination problems or something else?

My setup is:
A2000 3.1 roms (workbench 3.1)
A2030 030/882@25Mhx with 4Mb Ram
A2058 with 2Mb Ram (actually has 4 Mb, but jumper set to 2)
A2320 Display Enhancer
Picasso II with 2Mb
A2091
 - unit 1 IBM DSAS-3360 450MB Hard Drive
 - unit 2 Matshita CDROM CR-8005A (Apple 600i scsi 2 drive)

Any ideas appreciated :-?

Cheers

[sim]

Forgot to mention that I'm using the standard scsi.device (version 40.37 I think, but would need to double check)

[sim]

Thanks for the suggestions.  Both the hard drive (unit 1) and the CDROM drive (unit 2) have powered terminators controlled by jumpers.  I have the CDROM set to terminate and the hard drive set not to.  They're both connected internally like this:

A2091 -> hard drive -> CDROM

I assume that the A2091 provides termination for its end, as I don't have anything connected to it externally.

There's no trouble with data access to the hard drive, only the CDROM seems to have issues.

Cheers

[sim]

@machinehead

I had seen this, but it doesn't suggest anything that is definitely a problem.  It's always possible that upgrading the rom or scsi chip may help, but that's not easy to do so I'd rather know for sure it was the problem before trying to track down hard to find components.  (Not to mention I don't really want to throw a lot of money after such an old controller).

Thanks for the suggestion through.

Cheers

[sim]

@AmiMan

>Some Apple CD-Rom drives will NOT work with an Amiga computer because they were custom built for apple to only work on certain Macs.  

How do I know if this is one of those drives?


>Make sure the 3 resister packs are still soldered on the A2091 board next to the 50-pin ribbon cable connector.  If not then you will have to plug in an active terminator into the rear 25-pin SCSI port.  

Unfortunately I don't know what the resistor packs look like.  I've read about these being cut off to allow internal and external drives, but I haven't been able to find a photo with the specific components identified.  Any idea how I can confirm this?  I could post a picture of the board if someone can then point out the packs.


>Here is the way the Commodore A2091 board reads the SCSI chain:  IDs 0 to 2 are for hard drives, IDs 3 and 4 are for CD Rom drives, and IDs 5 and 6 are for ZIP, Tape drives, etc.  

That's interesting!  I've never heard this before.  I thought that any scsi device could be placed on any ID as long as it's unique.  In fact weren't the A2091's produced before CDROM drives were particularly common, let alone zip drives?  Still it's worth a try.  My hard drive is unit 1 at the moment and the CDROM unit 2, so I could try shifting the CDROM to unit 3 and see if it helps.


>The A2091 reads from SCSI ID 0 to 7, NOT from 7 to 0.

How does this affect things?  I assume that termination is interested in the physical order that the drives are chained, not the order that the unit IDs are set?  Am I wrong on this?


>Also looking at your setup, if there is DRAM installed on the A2091 then REMOVE THEM!  You can only have up to 8 megs on the Zorro II bus.  The 4 megs of memory on Commodores A2630 card, even though it is concidered 32-bit memory, it is still part of the Zorro II bus.  

Yup thanks, no memory on the A2091.  In fact I've already had to reduce the memory on the A2058 after installing the Picasso II board.


>I don't know why Commodore designed the A2630 board the way they did, but those of us that love this 68030 board have to live with it.  

I believe it was so that the memory was still available when you boot using the 68000 instead of the 68030.  Probably a good idea at the time (keeping backwards compatability) but a pain now as I really didn't want to go from 8MB to 6MB when installing the graphics card.


Thanks for the suggestions.  I'll try changing the CDROM unit ID and let you know how it goes.

Cheers

[sim]

Well, only took four months, but finally had a chance to play.  Thanks for all the suggestions but still not luck.I've managed to confirm that the resistor packs are still there.  I actually found I had a faulty SCSI cable, so had to replace that, however I think that came about while playing, as the original problem is still there.  I'm starting to think maybe it's a fault with the CDROM drive.  Unfortunately I don't have another computer with SCSI to try it on so I'm a bit stuck.

I recently acquired an XSurf card so I think I might try using an IDE drive connected to that instead.

Cheers

[sim]

Wow, you must be desparate for the stuff! :lol: Have you tried Kiwifruits, the New Zealand shop?  Not sure if you're in London, but they appear to mail order, and they have blackforest listed on their website: http://www.kiwifruitsnzshop.com

Thanks for the offer, but I'd hate for you to go to the effort (and cost) of posting the old drive all the way to NZ and for me to have difficulty getting it working.  It could still be the controller, rather than the drive that's causing the problem.

I'll try to have a look at the IDE option this weekend, but if your really desparate for the chocolate, and the kiwfruits shop doesn't work for you let me know.  It certainly sounds like a fair swap (assuming the chocolate makes it all the way to the UK intact... we used to have yummy foods go missing from packages when we were living overseas... not the UK mind you)

Cheers