A2000 plus Picasso = failure

[pondosinatra]

Ok, I've spent days (weeks?) on this and am about ready to toss it all in the garbage...

No matter what I can do I can't get it so that my Picasso card will 'keep' the resolution settings after a reboot or cold start.

I've tried two different A2000 (both rev 6.2), three different cards (Pic II, Pic II+, Pic IV), and two different accelerators (TekMagic 060, Phase 5 060).

The only clue I have is that when booting up, before WB loads, a message flashes saying something like 'could not create graphics board context'.

And this ONLY happens when I'm running an 060 accelerator. Stock A2000 is fine. 040 Accelerator is fine. :madashell:

[pondosinatra]

As it's working with 040 you probably have used the option "attach settings to board x"; this error pops up when the settings have not been attached to the board in use.

I do that when I go into P96mode and test and save the resolution I want...

[pondosinatra]

Apparently I'm the only person on the planet having this issue...

[pondosinatra]

Usually means that autoconfig has not allocated your gfx card's RAM space correctly.

What else do you have installed which sits in the Zorro II address space?

Use the command line program "showconfig DEBUG" to dump out your memory allocation and show us a screenshot.

Is it worth trying the Picasso in segmented mode (via a jumper) just to see if that works?

What does it say if you hold down both mouse buttons on boot and click on show-boards (or whatever it is)?

I've attached some screenshots. Besides the Picasso card, I also have an Ariadne network card in a Zorro slot.

I tried installing Cybergraphx v3 and I get the same thing. I can go into Screenmode and pick the CGX modes and it switches to them. But on a reboot or cold boot it doesn't 'keep'. Also, I told it to use one of the CGX splash screens and when it's booting it shows it on the LCD monitor (hi-res) but when WB loads it clicks off and I just get the lo-res screen on the Amiga monitor. If I try going into the Cybergraphx config tool it gives me a 'unable to open stlayout.library v22' error.

[pondosinatra]

(re: segmented mode) Don't know what happens - P96 doesn't support it. But CGX3 is freely available (for instance http://phase5.a1k.org/files/cgxv3.lha or Aminet), the hardware could be tested using it. I have used both and the difference wasn't too notable for me.

The only card that has a jumper for Segmented mode is the PII+. I've tried all three options (2MB, 1MB, Segmented) with no success.

[pondosinatra]

Anyone on here actually have an A2000 with an 060 and a working Picasso? :huh:

[pondosinatra]

I have a rev6.2 Amiga 2000 with a Blizzard 2060 and a Picasso II card installed, and it works fine for me.

I have kickstart 3.1 and Workbench 3.9 installed. I have tested P96 and CGX3, and also the drivers that came with the Picasso II card (egs?).

I have 2MB of Zorro II fast ram and 128MB of Blizzard RAM.

Can you send me your jumper settings? (for both proc card and vid card)?

And just for clarification.....when you say 'works fine for me' - do you mean when you reboot or do a cold start WB will go into the HiRes modes that you set? Because it does work for me as well - I just have to set the resolution everytime - it never 'remembers' it.

[pondosinatra]

Hang on a second!

How much memory does your '060 have set to autoconfig? (Check your jumper settings)...

The only memory related jumper on the Blizzard2060 is the MAPROM jumper which according to the manual:

"If you have installed memory (Fast RAM) on the BLIZZARD 2060, you can define through a jumper if the MAPROM function which copies the operating system into the faster Fast-RAM shall be activated or not. It is recommended to let the MAPROM function switched on at all times..."

[pondosinatra]

I've had all sorts of trouble (mostly me being a dumb user) with my A2000/PII machine.

However, the above is one problem that DID go away once I upgraded my PSU to a 300w ATX unit.

Before doing that, I replaced with a different A2000 PSU & the problem only sometimes presented itself, but once the much better ATX unit was installed....never again

PZ.

That might explain why it works with the 040 card and not the 060 (although I thought the 060 used less power)....know where I can get one of these power supplies (anything on eBay is the stock PS's).

[pondosinatra]

Use a PC ATX unit like I did. Cheap & easy

Check Stedy's guide for a how-to: http://www.ianstedman.co.uk/Amiga/amiga_hacks/Amiga_Power_supplies/body_amiga_power_supplies.html#Fitting_a_new_PSU_to_an_A2000

Make sure to test the PSU with a multimeter though. First one I tried didn't work & I freaked about killing the A2000. The PSU was just dead! LOL

PZ.

I took a look but couldn't make much sense, other than changing the jumper on the motherboard - I'm guessing I'd be doing wire stripping? If I don't solder the wires then wouldn't I need some kind of wiring connector???

[pondosinatra]

"A new connector is an TBD 14 way connector."

If you are unable/unwilling to do the job yourself, you can always buy a good quality adaptor cable:
http://amigamaniac.com/atx_to_amiga.html

PZ.

Awesome! Thanks for that! :banana:

[pondosinatra]

Hot damn! I think I got it!

I reinstalled 3.1 from scratch, installed the Blizzard 060 libraries, slapped in my PII+, installed P96, went into P96 mode, attached the board, tested the resolution I wanted, rebooted, went into Screenmode, picked a high resolution, clicked use, the LCD monitor kicked in with the display, then I hit Save. Rebooted....and...and it didn't go into the low-res screen but kicked in on the LCD! I powered off and on just to be sure and it still worked.

So I don't know what the problem was. Maybe something in the order of how I installed things? Maybe I didn't utter the right incantations to the Amiga Gods...who knows.

I just know I'm happy right now.

Oh and as an added bonus to all of this, I put in a brand new PC power supply to run things off of.

[pondosinatra]

Goddamn it!

As mentioned earlier, everything was working fine, and I set it aside on a shelf since then. Just tonight I powered it up again and the POS is doing the same thing! It won't boot into the hi-res mode, and while I can test it fine in the high res modes it won't 'keep' the setting.

I'm so tired of this.

[pondosinatra]

Looking through this thread, I didn't see where you mentioned what version of P96 you're using. I ran an A2000 with an 060 and PII card for a few years with a couple of hiccups at first, just as you're experiencing. Weak power supply attributed to part of it (strange artifacting on the display), but the other issue, where it would refuse to save your settings was the version of P96 used. The one and only version of P96 that worked really well for me was the one that asks for a donation at early install:

http://aminet.net/package/driver/video/Picasso96

...others have already mentioned your 060 libraries. Be sure you've got the latest of those as well. And be sure the latest 68040 library is in there too, even when using your 060 card. Somebody else will be able to explain better why this is, but unless I'm totally off the mark, you need both of those libs installed (even if you're only running an 060 card) in order for everything to be kosher.

And as Damion mentioned, going through and hard deleting old config files throughout Prefs/envarc is a good idea. As an extra precaution, instead of relying on a warm boot after deleting, I'd turn the computer off, wait several seconds and then turn back on. Fun "haunted" stuff we sometimes deal with!  :lol:

The P96 I use it the latest off Aminet, the libraries are the latest from Phase5's site. I'm using a PC power supply.

I'm going to do a reinstall (again) this weekend.

In the past I'd install 3.1 using a A2091 board and then switch in the 060 accelerator after. This time I'm going to try booting with the Phase5 disc and try installing 3.1 directly and then upgrading to 3.9. I'm also going to leave out the NIC card in case it's conflicting somehow.

I do have the emergency restore floppy I created but I can't boot off of it because admist all my frustration the floppy drive decided to die on me.

Sigh.

[pondosinatra]

So it looks like it's working now. To recap:

- copied the 68040new.library to the 3.1 Install disk and renamed it to 68040.library. This allowed me to boot into 3.1 with just my Blizzard 060 card and not have to use the 2091 as an interim step
- installed P96 and configured the monitor and thankfully it remembered the resolution I set and would boot with the higher res and load on the LCD monitor
- installed IDEFix and got it to recognize my CD drive
- installed OS 3.9 and created an emergency disc

I've done several reboots and power cycles and my issues haven't come back.

The only thing that was different is I haven't yet installed the Internet connectivity and the drivers for my Ariadne? nic card.