A1200 Pointer Corruption

[Slash]

Hi all,

I have some dodgy pointer corruption occuring with my mouse pointer, even in the ESM... when the pointer is near the top of the screen a garbled pointer image is repeated down the screen.

Any ideas?

I've just installed a CF card as a HDD in my A1200; could that have something to do with it?

I'll try and get an image of the corruption tonight.

TIA
Daniel

[Mizar]

Hi all,

I have some dodgy pointer corruption occuring with my mouse pointer, even in the ESM... when the pointer is near the top of the screen a garbled pointer image is repeated down the screen.

Any ideas?

I've just installed a CF card as a HDD in my A1200; could that have something to do with it?

I'll try and get an image of the corruption tonight.

TIA
Daniel

What's ESM?

Ooh... that doesn't sound good.  Did you take the proper ESD precautions when installing your CF HD?  Was there any debris that might have fallen inside the A1200?

[Daedalus]

If you're running on a native screen, the pointer is a hardware sprite and as such might be tricky to grab (I've never tried though, correct me if I'm wrong). That sort of corruption sounds like a memory speedup patch or something isn't quite working. When you installed the CF card, did you use the same installation you had beforehand? What other hardware do you have in there? If the CF card was preinstalled it may have patches etc. configured which don't play nicely with your CPU...

[Slash]

ESM = Early Startup Menu.

There's nothing else inside, just a bog standard Commodore A1200 which I purchased on eBay. I've never noticed the pointer before at the same time, I never used it with a hard drive; just for games.

I'll have a good look inside tonight, and take a shot of the screen. I'll do it with my camera so I can get the corruption.

The CF card was installed from scratch by myself, using a StarTech adapter and a blank 4Gb Transcend CF card.

[Franko]

I'm assuming by "ESM" you mean the Early StartUp Menu or Screen...

If your getting sprite corruption there, then I don't think it's anything to do with stuff you may have running in the StartUp-Sequence, nor does it appear to be faulty ROMS (where the image data for the pointer is stored) as if the ROMS were faulty this would show up on the Amigas BootStrap check...

Have you tried removing the CF HDD board to see if the problem still occurs when it's removed, if so and the problem still remains then it would seem that you have damaged your Amiga in some way and if not then it must be something to do with the CF adapter itself...

Simplest way to check is remove the CF board and power up your Amiga and check out the Early Startup Screen and see if the problem still occurs...

[Khephren]

Hi all,

I have some dodgy pointer corruption occuring with my mouse pointer, even in the ESM... when the pointer is near the top of the screen a garbled pointer image is repeated down the screen.

Daniel

Boot from floppy or an unmodified WB install? do you still get the coruption?
your getting it from early startup, is the problem there from a cold boot? or only from a reset?

[Amiga_Nut]

Sounds like hardware problem to me if it is happening on a hardware sprite and on the ESM. ie whichever custom chip produces the sprites I guess.

[Daedalus]

Yeah, sorry - didn't realise that's what ESM was :p Does it still happen without the CF card in there? If so it does indeed sound like a custom chip fault (I believe Lisa is responsible for the sprites...)

[Slash]

Bit of an update... the corruption only occurs when the machine has warmed up. It doesn't happen at all when first switched on.

I've managed to take a photo of the corruption on my phone to better explain what's going on...



As you can see, this only happens when I drag an icon around on the screen, or like I said when I'm in the ESM.

Any ideas or should I just ebay another A1200?

[Slash]

*BUMP*

Anyone seen this type of corruption before and if so, what to do to fix it?

[Franko]

Hmmm... as the sprite for the pointer is drawn using a copper list then what you getting here is corrupt sprite data in the copper list. Which is making the sprite think it's length is what you are seeing on the screen and filling it with whatever data is in the memory that the sprites data is pointing too...

This would seem to indicate a Hardware problem (as your getting it even in the ESM), unfortunately I don't think there is any way to fix this yourself, as the problem could be either in the memory chips (unlikely) or one of the custom chips that draws the display...

Have you tried removing the CF Board yet to see it this solves the problem, cos otherwise it certainly looks like you'll eiether need to get someone to try and repair it or cut your losses and buy a new one... sorry but unless someone else knows better then I'd say your Amiga is broken...

[Khephren]

What franko said,
I'd check your chips for damage. Can you run the machine for a long time with apps going? If so it probably isn't ram.

Do you get this corruption in games that use sprites etc? If you do, it points more to the custom chips.

Bit of a bugger either way

[gertsy]

Hmm, Not good. Check all the socketed chips are secure.  I think that's Roms only in an A1200.  As Franko says try it w/o the CFCard inside.  Also look for any loose bits on the MB. Do a bit of praying and try again...

Alice or Lisa might be out to dinner..

[Franko]

No idea what type of CFcard/board he's using but it could very well be that it's interfering somehow with the data paths/bus for the sprite display, before consigning the Amiga to the bin it would be wise to remove it first and see if the problem still persists...

@Gertsy, yup... the only socketed chips in an A1200 are the ROMs...

[gertsy]

No idea what type of CFcard/board he's using but it could very well be that it's interfering somehow with the data paths/bus for the sprite display, before consigning the Amiga to the bin it would be wise to remove it first and see if the problem still persists...

@Gertsy, yup... the only socketed chips in an A1200 are the ROMs...

2 right.  How come ur profile ON light is never glowing Franko.  Is that a CP thing.?