Jumpers on GVP HC8+

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

Hi,

Does anyone know what the jumpers J3 and J10-12 do on the GVP HC8+ board?  I've got the manual but it only says "here there be jumpers", nothing about what they do, LOL.  :p  I'm assuming the block of 3 might be for changing the SCSI ID (??), they were all off when I got the card.

Still trying to nail down some compatibility issues and crashes with that board in my A2000.  Thanks!


Also, and this might be of interest to absolutely no one, but I noticed that with the GVP ROM in my GeForce card I can completely remove the ROM and the "BOOT" jumper on the HC8+, and the ROM on the GeForce "takes over" the HC8+, so I can plug my drives into either card and boot off it.  In other words, if I have the "boot" jumper set on my GeForce, the system will boot off the drives regardless if they're physically plugged into either the GeForce or the HC8+.  Thought that was kind of interesting.  

[Metalguy66]

J2 switches the clockspeed of the 33c93/A chip between 7mhz and 14mhz

J3 enables/disables Autoconfig

J4 enables/disables Autoboot

J5-J9 Memory size/population config

J10-J12 SCSI ID of Host controller (default is all 3 jumpers closed, which is ID 7)

The HC+8 is a good card. One of the fastest ZII cards I personally remember owning/using. However, there are a few things you should know:

 If it's randomly locking up with the access LED on solid, then chances are you have a bad connection at the cardslot, bad connection at a simm socket, or it just doesnt like some one of the SIMMs you have in it. (The dram conrtrol design on this card is a little temperamental. Once you find a good combination/config, its rock-stable.. Its just that some times you have to do some trial & error before you find a memory config/combination that it likes).

 I also would not reccomend powering a drive off the card, unless its a low-power device like a CF card or maybe a modern notebook drive. Alwayse power internal drives directly from the PSU, not from the +5v/+12 on a zorro card.

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

Thanks!  Interestingly enough when I jumper J3, not only does it disable autoconfig for the HC8+, it disables it for everything - neither my AD516 nor my Tandem HD controller show up, either.  Oh well, it was worth a shot.

I've been trying to narrow down what combination I need to get both a GeForce 040 and a HC8+ to work together simultaneously for a couple weeks.  At first I thought it was jumpers, then I thought it was ROM's, then bad memory, then a bad memory socket on the board, then a rogue program in Startup-Sequence, etc.

Now it looks like I've finally narrowed it down to one thing:

The SetPatch line in BB4.  Something in that line flips a trigger that gives me error messages like the attached screenshot and random lockups, with the HC8+.  SetPatch is version 44.38 (I can't find the supposed newer version, 44.39, online anywhere).  There's only two things left at play here:

- I can boot normally if I disable the RAM on the HC8+
- I can boot normally if I disable the SetPatch line in the Startup-Sequence (obviously without the benefit of SetPatch, the system kind of runs like crud)

All the memory sticks worked fine in my A500 GVP sidecar, and have passed several different memory tests in my A2000, as well.

Line is:

C:SetPatch SKIPROMUPDATES console.device,filesystem,FileSystem.resource,shell QUIET

Goal is to be able to use both cards, the GeForce as an accelerator + 32-bit RAM and the HC8+ for it's faster SCSI and a little bit of extra memory.  Still fishing for ideas, feel like this is going to be a long-term project, LOL.  

[motrucker]

Mike,
   I used to have one of these cards (might still have it), that work fine in my A2000 until I went to upgrade to 3.9OS. Never did get it working right. It worked with 3.1 and 3.5, but not 3.9.

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

Mike,
   I used to have one of these cards (might still have it), that work fine in my A2000 until I went to upgrade to 3.9OS. Never did get it working right. It worked with 3.1 and 3.5, but not 3.9.

Well that seems to be it, then!    Seems to be the 3.9 SetPatch and the HC8+ don't play nice together, I wonder if a Guru ROM would help with that?  Check out these couple photos from when I boot 3.9 with no startup-sequence and then try to run SetPatch, that's immediately when the output becomes garbled.

I've tried moving around scsi.device, ram-handler, etc., from the SKIPROMUPDATES list, moving them to the LoadModule line, etc., but no love.  I just don't know enough about what that line does to make any effective changes.  Maybe if I try "SKIPROMUPDATES gvpscsi.device"?  No idea.    It seems to be in the ram-handler portion more than scsi, since it's only when the memory is enabled on the card that my system goes fubar.  :-/

[motrucker]

Yea, you can sure see when screws up. I don't know if the new ROM will cure it ir not. Ask Mechy - He may know....

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

FYI, I gave up on trying to get this card to work. Darned unfortunate considering what a great card it's supposed to be, but I just don't have any time. Still banging my head against the wall with my Thylacine too, LOL. :p
 
Here's the GVP card for sale, if anyone's interested. I might drop the price a bit if it doesn't go in a few days, just ball-parked it based on what I spent. *sigh*
 
http://www.amibay.com/showthread.php?t=53194

[mechy]

FYI, I gave up on trying to get this card to work. Darned unfortunate considering what a great card it's supposed to be, but I just don't have any time. Still banging my head against the wall with my Thylacine too, LOL. :p
 
Here's the GVP card for sale, if anyone's interested. I might drop the price a bit if it doesn't go in a few days, just ball-parked it based on what I spent. *sigh*
 
http://www.amibay.com/showthread.php?t=53194

before you give up, you might try a fresh 3.9 install on another drive without boingbags 3-4.. those have caused me headaches and some others as well. if that doesnt work,fall back to 3.1 and try the hardware etc. then move forward again.

this would eliminate any odd stuff going on.

[magnetic]

before you give up, you might try a fresh 3.9 install on another drive without boingbags 3-4.. those have caused me headaches and some others as well..

I also heartily recommend NOT using the hackathon "Boing Bag 3 and 4" Even though many knowledgeable amigans worked out these patch/hack upgrades i'm sure they can lead to a lot of instability especially for novice amiga os users.