Damn A2500, PLEASE work!! Amiga.org, advice is appreciated!

[Beast96GT]

Guys,

I'd like to see if I can get some kind of display out the 2500 I grabbed off fleabay.  I got really impatient since I can't find a scandoubler, and I'm still waiting for an A520 to come in, so I hooked up the TV tuner card I use on the PeeCee to the video "mono" from the A2500.  The screen comes on, but I just get a grey screen.  The hard drive spins every once in a while, but no disk drives light up.

Is the miggy looking for a connection other than mouse/keyboard or there's no output on the RCA video "mono"?  I really hope this thing works.  

Thanks!!

Chris (Beast)

[rkauer]

 That "grey" screen could be any solid colour. Open the Amiga and start pressing the chips back in place, specially the ROM chip.

 Also check for battery leakage.

[Beast96GT]

rkauer wrote:
 That "grey" screen could be any solid colour. Open the Amiga and start pressing the chips back in place, specially the ROM chip.

 Also check for battery leakage.

Thanks for the reply.  The grey screen looks like the one you see when you first book up the miggy... but no workbench screen.

Can the chips really pop out?  I mean, I always thought that was the joke, "drop the amiga 6" from the surface to re-seat the chips".  

Anyway, the battery is great:
Battery

I guess my real question is, SHOULD I get a picture out of the video out in the back?  

If so, I'll start pulling cards and diagnosing the thing.

Chris

[Terse]

Beast96GT wrote:

rkauer wrote:
 That "grey" screen could be any solid colour. Open the Amiga and start pressing the chips back in place, specially the ROM chip.

 Also check for battery leakage.

Thanks for the reply.  The grey screen looks like the one you see when you first book up the miggy... but no workbench screen.

Can the chips really pop out?  I mean, I always thought that was the joke, "drop the amiga 6" from the surface to re-seat the chips".  

Anyway, the battery is great:
Battery

I guess my real question is, SHOULD I get a picture out of the video out in the back?  

If so, I'll start pulling cards and diagnosing the thing.

Chris

Yes, there should be an image.  The pooper trooper is right about reseating.  If there is no drive activity or lights, you might try disconnecting the drives altogether and see if it boots to a WB prompt then.
Since it's an a2500, you may want to try removing the CPU card and trying again.

[rkauer]

 "Pooper trooper"!:lol::lol::lol::lol::lol::-)

 Oh, just for my curiosity: does the power led lit dimly then go brighter? If not, you have an early hardware problem (like not seated ROM/chip or a bad custom chip).

 But without a proper 15kHz-able monitor or an A520 not much to tell. :shrug:

[tone007]

First thing to do with any old 2000/2500 you pick up, look under the drive sled to see if the battery has leaked and wrecked the motherboard.  Pushing on all the chips in the world generally won't help that.
 
Happens too often, unfortunately.

[Beast96GT]

tone007 wrote:
First thing to do with any old 2000/2500 you pick up, look under the drive sled to see if the battery has leaked and wrecked the motherboard.  Pushing on all the chips in the world generally won't help that.
 
Happens too often, unfortunately.

Thanks for the note, BUT... again:  BATTERY

It looks fine.  I think the best thing to do is start pulling cards till I get a work-bench icon.  

[da9000]

Beast,

your battery does NOT look fine. In the left leg, at the very bottom I see corrosion. That doesn't mean that it's eaten away the whole motherboard, and it looks like it hasn't spread a lot so the battery isn't the problem most likely, but again: that battery needs to go!

I'd do what Rkauer is saying: remove all extraneous boards, reseat all chips. Yes they do come out by constant cycles of contraction/expansion due to heat/cold. The old story about dropping it from up high was for A500s, and it does work, although it's for lazy people who don't want to open the machine. I wouldn't try it with an A2000, especially not over your feet :-D

[Beast96GT]

After pulling all the cards, drives, etc, I've narrowed it down to the Nexus hard card (unfortunately).  It will boot about half the time, otherwise just give me a grey screen.  It was a little tricky since it still boots every so often with the card still in.

I'm guessing I can just move the hard drive to a different card?  

Anyway, when I finally saw the disk prompt screen *finally* show up I was elated.  I mean, I knew the night was blown since I would do nothing but tinker with the thing.  

[amigaksi]

Could be the hard drive and NOT the nexus card.
Perhaps, hard drive has reached the MTBF or boot block of HD is corrupted and Amiga is getting stuck trying to get it to boot (if set to boot mode).  I once had a hard drive failure, but my controller had a method to disable autoboot so I was able to boot from floppy and then after running some HD utility enable the HD and retrieve files from the failed hard drive.

[Beast96GT]

amigaksi wrote:
Could be the hard drive and NOT the nexus card.
Perhaps, hard drive has reached the MTBF or boot block of HD is corrupted and Amiga is getting stuck trying to get it to boot (if set to boot mode).  I once had a hard drive failure, but my controller had a method to disable autoboot so I was able to boot from floppy and then after running some HD utility enable the HD and retrieve files from the failed hard drive.

Will it boot without the hard drive and with just the card in the slot?  I do have another hard drive, I think it's a 250 meg, but I'm certain it's an axillary not a boot.  Maybe just hook it up to see if it boots?

[amigaksi]

If you are having problems booting without the nexus card and hard drive, you have some other problem in the system.
If you are having problems booting without the nexus card but same hard drive on another hard drive controller, you have a hard drive problem.
Otherwise, you have a nexus card problem.

My hard drive controller has this switch on the card itself for autoboot or not.  I guess the hard drive also has to be enabled for boot as well.  So both should be taken into account.  If you cannot disable autoboot on your card, you may still have a problem booting if your 250Meg HD is an auxiliary and working and not enabled for boot.

On my system, the system will boot eventually boot from floppy if the hard drive is bad but controller is good, but you just have to give it a long wait (all retries time-out).

[terminator4]

if your amiga 2000 won't boot, then strip all the cards, and try getting the kickrom screen (the hand with disk) on.  then add cards as needed. if still no kick screen then remove chips and re-insert them gently.  you have to get the kick screen first before troubleshooting anything else!