A3000 Won't Boot / SCSI Termination Woes (I think...)

[bertambala]

Hi everyone,

My trusty Amiga 3000 (25/030) will no longer boot.  More specifically, when I turn it on the HDD flickers for a moment like usual, but then turns on solid and I'm unable to even access the boot menu by holding down both mouse buttons.  Here's the lead-up to how I got in this situation:

1)  The machine was running fine with 1.4 ROMs (booting 2.x from the HDD).  I recently got an external CD-ROM working with the help of a newly acquired Asim_CDFS v.3 disk, and after that success I got an external SCSI HDD working as well.

2)  After living with a nearly full 8 MB boot partition for the past 13 years, I finally decided to do something about it.  I backed up both partitions on the internal HDD to my external, and then repartitioned the drive.  So far so good.  I used my Superkickstart disk to load a 2.x ROM, and then used one of my 3.1 disks to get to the desktop.

3)  Once in WB again I realized that the format program in 3.1 is not compatible with the 2.x ROMs.  I decided against rummaging around in the attic for my 2.05 floppies, and reinstalled my 3.1 ROMs.  Booted into 3.1 and formatted both internal partitions.  Things still work.

4)  It was at this time that I realized I could not get either my external CD-ROM or HDD to work, even though they are connected in the same manner as before.  Actually, when running HDToolbox all seven positions were recognized as my internal HDD, and a warning came up that "Some drives have been removed from the system, and this information needs to be recorded somewhere" (or something to that effect.  I ignored this many times, and kept powering down and hooking up the two external devices in different configurations...all to no avail.

5).  I installed 3.1 on the internal drive and proceeded to use HDToolbox - this time clicking "Save Changes" for each of the 6 mysterious Quantum drives in hopes that they would go away.  When I rebooted I was greeted with a non-functioning computer.

I'm assuming that the trouble I'm facing is due to improper SCSI termination...most likely on the motherboard or on the internal drive.  I'll readily admit that I don't know much about this matter, so I'm hoping someone here can give me some advice on how to proceed.

If I recall correctly my daughterboard says it's a revision 7.1 (in case that's the same number for my motherboard), though I'd have to check again to make sure.  I don't currently have a passive terminator, but I  do have an active one for one of my external devices.  Thanks in advance!

[patrik]

If you are using an external CD-rom, the SCSI-chain should be terminated on the internal scsi-chain, after the harddrive, have no termination on the motherboard itself (as it then is in the middle of the scsi-chain) and be terminated on the external scsi-chain after the CD-ROM.

At what IDs have you set your HD and CD-ROM?

Also do a search for "Specific Troublesome Devices" on this page and see if any of these issues applies to your A3000. There are also some good termination guidelines and examples there.


/Patrik

[MrZammler]

Generally, I've found that scsi termination stuff on the A3000 do not always work. It's kind of a hit and miss situation.

Do as patrik said. Overall, you should have your last devices terminated, use the proper jumper on each device. Check your id's so that they wont be the same on devices on each end of the chain.

[motorollin]

Welcome to amiga.org :-)

What makes you think it's a termination problem? If the SCSI devices are connected and terminated the same way they were before, then why would re-partitioning cause a termination problem?

Why don't you try disconnecting everything form the SCSI chain and see if you can get to the early startup screen. If you can, then connect your devices one at a time and terminate the chain, checking you can get to the early startup screen each time.

--
moto

[Tahoe]

Okay, I thought the problem was me... Now I realise it might be a little more complicated....

I have the same SCSI woes in an A3000 as you do.... Without changing anything physically with the drive I have found that one of my drives:
1. Works and is recognised but won't boot if I load a Super Kickstart from disk; either 1.3, 2.0, 2.04 or 3.1
2. Works, Boots, Formats and it generally runs perfectly fine running Kickstart 2.0 from hard drive
3. Does NOT work when replacing the kick2.0 hardfile with a 3.1 one. the machine boots; loads it's Kickstart file, reboots and then hangs the same manner as yours does; SCSI light won't go off and it just sits there. Much like a termination problem, however hardware wise nothing has been changed....

This happens to me with ONE specific type of IBM (200MB) hard drive. A 2GB Seagate works fine in the above scenario....

Almost as if the IBM drive is NOT compatible with Kickstart 3.1... I have tried al manner of things concerning termination; it simply will not work using Kickstart 3.1...

Using a rev 8 SCSI chip BTW, on a rev 9.03 A3000...

[Noster]

Hi,

> What makes you think it's a termination problem? If the SCSI devices are connected
> and terminated the same way they were before, then why would re-partitioning
> cause a termination problem?
If I've read right, he previously used Kick 2.x and now switched to Kick 3.1. Maybe the scsi.device has been changed and now his configuration doesn't work?

How about softkicking Kickstart 3.1 and using HDToolBox from OS 3.1 or softkicking Kickstart 2.0 and using HDToolBox from OS 2.0? I think you have some troubles because of mixing the Kickstart and Workbench versions. How about purchasing an Kickstart 3.1 ROM? This would also speed-up coldstart and reduce your problems.

Generally as already said: Remove all external drives, terminate the internal drive, add the termination resistors to the mobo or add an external (active) terminator and try to access your hd through HDtoolBox. I wouldn't partition the drive using OS 3.1 HDToolBox if I want to install OS 2.x, this might result in troubles with the version of the filesystem.

Check your cable! I've had mysterious fallouts of my drive because of an (invisible) defective cable.

Noster

[motorollin]

Noster wrote:
If I've read right, he previously used Kick 2.x and now switched to Kick 3.1. Maybe the scsi.device has been changed and now his configuration doesn't work?

Could be! Maybe the RDB is trashed and it's causing problems under 3.1 which didn't occur unter 2.x? How about low level formatting the drive in a different machine, and then trying again with 3.1?

Noster wrote:
How about softkicking Kickstart 3.1 and using HDToolBox from OS 3.1 or softkicking Kickstart 2.0 and using HDToolBox from OS 2.0?

Can't softkick if the machine won't boot  :-(

--
moto

[bertambala]

patrik:  Thanks for the input, I'll have to check out that link tomorrow.  My setup is currently one internal HDD (original 100MB Quantum), an external Club Mac HDD (160 MB Quantum), and an external Micronet CD-ROM.  The CD-ROM ID is set to 4, the Club Mac to 2, and the internal to 6.  I looked at my motherboard and it looks un-terminated (missing resistor packs that are on the internal HDD).  I had the Club Mac hooked up the 3000, and the CD-ROM hooked up to the Club Mac, with a terminator on the CD-ROM - so it sounds like what you described.

MrZammler: When you refer to using the correct jumper, do you mean the jumpers for setting the SCSI IDs?

motorollin:  Thank you for the welcome, I'm glad to be here!  I suspect a termination problem because of the chain of events that led me to my current situation.  Notably, HDTools seeing my single internal HDD as 7 different drives.  I'm far from a SCSI expert, so perhaps it's just wishful thinking.  I did disconnect all SCSI devices and I'm able to boot from a floppy.  For further detail of where I'm at, see below.

Tahoe:  On one hand it's nice to know that it's not just me having this problem, but on the other it's kind of depressing - it stings a bit to know that the 3.1 ROM upgrade I spent $180 (USD) on in 1999 is causing me problems.  I haven't tried softkicking anything besides 1.3 and 2.x, but I might give that a go if nothing else seems to work.  You never know what'll help with this A3000 SCSI voodoo. hehe

Noster:  I am using real 3.1 ROMs (Amiga Technologies GmbH), which is why I'm surprised by the troubles I'm facing.  I've been suspecting that the SCSI driver in the 1.4 ROMs is different than the one in the 3.1 ROMs, but haven't read anything online to that effect.  I have some extra cables to test out, so I'll give that a try as well.  I would actually prefer to use the 3.1 ROMs vs. softkicking 2.x, if for no other reason than to gain 512 KB of fast RAM.  I still don't have a passive terminator (should get one on Monday from a friend at work), but I did hook up a cable connected directly to the active terminator.  Unfortunately my system still hung on boot.

I've been trying a lot of different things with my machine this afternoon and evening.  To make a long story short: I disconnected my internal HDD and now I'm able to boot from a floppy.  I hooked up my external HDD with a terminator, and I'm able to access it after booting WB from a floppy, and HDToolbox correctly reports only one SCSI device (ID 2).  I was able to backup some of my more critical files to floppy, but I started getting  a frozen system a few files in, so I'm still being cautious with that drive.

Does the 3000 write a SCSI device table to the HDD, or is that information stored in some kind of NVRAM, or is it generated on the fly at bootup?  I was thinking that a corrupt SCSI table of sorts was written to my intenral HDD when I saved the six mystery drives in HDToolbox, and that's why my system is hanging...?  If so, would putting that drive in the external enclosure allow me to boot from floppy and re-write the table?  My A4000 motherboard is out for repairs right now, and I don't have a SCSI controller for it anyway.  Perhaps I could peform a low-level format with x86 Linux, and then reinstall the drive on the Amiga to see if things are resolved...?

I'd like to say "THANK YOU!" to everyone here for taking the time to reply to my post.  It's amazing and wonderful to get this kind of response for such an old system.  I look forward to any replies, and I'll certainly keep you all updated on any progress I might make wtih the ol' miggy.

[motorollin]

bertambala wrote:
Does the 3000 write a SCSI device table to the HDD, or is that information stored in some kind of NVRAM, or is it generated on the fly at bootup?

Kickstart probes the SCSI bus on boot and then queries each drive to check whether it is bootable. Nothing is stored anywhere.

bertambala wrote:
I was thinking that a corrupt SCSI table of sorts was written to my intenral HDD when I saved the six mystery drives in HDToolbox, and that's why my system is hanging...?

Not SCSI table, but perhaps partition table (which is stored in the RDB of the disk). You can see your backup drive and the files on it which is good, because you know your backup is ok. So I would low level format your internam disk to wipe out the RDB and partitions, then reinstall the disk in 3.1 HDToolBox, recreate partitions, and copy the data back.

I suspect this problem has occurred because you used 2.1 HDToolBox with 3.1 ROM.

--
moto

[bertambala]

Hi Motorollin,

I follow you now.  The only problem is that whenever the internal HDD is connected, my system hangs before I can do anything.  I don't have another Amiga with a SCSI controller, so I connected the drive to my Kubuntu box which was able to read the partitions.  I repartitioned the drive and formated it to EXT2 and reconnected it to the Amiga, but I had the same result.  I tried to use the scsitools package to perform a lowlevel format in Linux, but I didn't have any success (ran out of time).

I'm getting a 2 GB SCSI drive from a friend this week, and I should be getting a passive SCSI terminator from another friend at work on Monday.  Hopefully between those two items I'll get the 3000 back up and running.  I'll post my results.  Thanks again!  

[bertambala]

Well folks, I tried using a couple different HDDs, different cables (with cable terminators and without), both with a terminated CD-ROM connected to the external SCSI and without, but the system would hang anytime an internal HDD was connected.

I ended up putting the 1.4 ROMs back in the machine, and was able to use the internal and external SCSI devices again.  Oddly enough I couldn't get one of the larger/newer (2.1 GB) SCSI drives to work with KS1.4 internally either - so I'm back to the 100 MB Quantum that came with the machine.  Oh well, at least it's working again.

As a side note, after setting the drive up with 2.05 I reinstalled the 3.1 ROMs and was able to use the internal HDD, but HDToolbox again reported 7 drives being connected - so I put 1.4 back in again.  

My 3.1 ROMs are labled as Kickstart V40.68 and came from Amiga Technologies...could it be that there is something wrong with them?

edit:  everything works wonderfully when softkicking 3.1 (V40.55), though I suspect that is because the SCSI drivers included in the 1.4 ROMs are being used whether I softkick 2.x or 3.x...?

[Tahoe]

Sure those ROM's (40.68) aren't A4000 ROM's? It would explain all the trouble...

[bertambala]

I sure hope not, seeing as how I just purchased some 3.1 ROMs and a OS 3.9 disk from Softhut for my 4000.

I'm pretty sure that they aren't for a 4000 because I'm looking at the original packing they came in, and the side of the box is marked "AS 330 - A3000, 3000T", and the ROMs themselves have white stickers on them stating:
    Kickstart V40.68
    Amiga 3000-0 (-1 for the second ROM)
    (C) 1983-1994 Commodore
    All Rights Reserved

From what I understand the ROMs for the 4000 only have drivers for IDE built in, so I wouldn't be able to boot at all from a SCSI machine if that was the case, right?

[glitch]

You might want to find and try the SetBatt (should still be able to find it on Aminet) utility too.  Has anyone else tried this recently?  Help him out guys as I don't have an A3000 anymore.  Doesn't that program clear out a few of the SCSI settings (and a few others) that might cause such a problem???

GOOD LUCK!