Desperate in Texas

[Heiroglyph]

As some of you know, I've got a TON of Amiga's and parts.  The problem is that I have yet to get a stable one built.  (well, there was one that is now gone, but that's a long sad story...)

What makes these systems go randomly bad with age?  No battery leakage on the ones I'm mainly trying.

Bill P. even knew how much trouble I have had and was nice enough to send me an awesome system that was no longer in use, but it is also suffering from old age since it was last used.  The Warp Engine 040 has ram errors if memory is installed and it seems to heat up and get progressively worse to the point it won't even boot from floppy.

What are you guys doing to keep them usable?

Is there anyone in the San Antonio area that would be willing to take a look in exchange for a boatload of Amiga hardware?  4000T's, bunch of 4000D's, 060 cards, 040 cards, PCI backplanes, I've got a pretty serious load of systems and good (well, costly...) parts I'm willing to give up if you can solve the problem.

All I want is a stable system (no hardware failure reboots, no disk errors) that I can develop on, but I just can't seem to make it happen.

[Darrin]

I think the main thing is to pick one system and work on that.  I have my FPGA Amigas, A1200s, A2000, A3000 and A4000 and if I try and spend time on all of them then I get nowhere.

Decide what you actually need and then look at the single system that will allow you to do it and focus on that.

If you're ever use the I10 to cross into Louisiana then give me a call, I'll be glad to help if I can, or perhaps I can assist by sending you a preconfigured hard drive or CF Card to boot from.  :-)

[ChaosLord]

I goto SA every time a Hurricane hits Houston.  If u remind me next time maybe I give u a visit

I would be going inside the loop in the northern half.  Izzat close 2 u?

[Heiroglyph]

True, I have shifted focus from systems to system.  When you're swapping parts long enough you're eventually on the next one

I'd really like this E-Box cased 4000D to work.  I think it would be the best overall system, even better than the 4000T's since it has the Mediator PCI in it.  I'd have to use the Prometheus in the T's to get similar expansion.

The hangup is that I have an 060 and an 040 desktop CPU cards of questionable quality and (to my knowledge) a good one of those massive Quickpak 060's that won't fit in the D.

I hate to drop $600 on one of those "new" GVP 060's when I'm not sure my motherboards are good.

[Heiroglyph]

I goto SA every time a Hurricane hits Houston.  If u remind me next time maybe I give u a visit

I would be going inside the loop in the northern half.  Izzat close 2 u?

Extremely close if you mean 1604, not far if you mean 410 but outside that loop.

Wow, I wonder if I know you from Houston?  I was there for about ten years.

You're welcome to drop by even if it doesn't involve the unstable system.

Is it bad to hope for a natural disaster?

[CaptainN]

Greetings Heiroglyph I live in Corpus Christi TX, your neighbor 2 hours away.  I own a retro video game store here in Corpus for games ranging from Atari to PS2/Xbox 1.  I dont normally sell amigas because people here dont really know about them too much, but I do own a few and will be more than happy to help you out anyway I can.

Do you ever make it down to Corpus?  I go to San Antonio every so often and would love to meet another fellow Amiga enthusist.

Drop me a PM and we can see if we can help you out.

[Heiroglyph]

Cool, another semi-local!

I'm trying not to just buy a new one.  Amigas don't get much better than the parts I have available, there's just something I'm missing or a common factor like maybe dried out caps.

Still trying to get in touch with Cosmos but I guess he's been busy.  I was going to send him some stuff and order new caps for a few motherboards.

[ChaosLord]

Hey guys, I can never remember who is from Texas and who is not.
So I created a new Texas Amiga.org Social group so that we can keep track of ourselves.  Please consider joining:

http://www.amiga.org/forums/group.php?groupid=57

[SACC-guy]

@heiro
Two thoughts: As you mentioned the caps, and have you tested the power supplys?
I too, have a power tower with everything, the power supply was way too small...and old.

I bought a 4000 to atx power adaptor from amigakit and a 450 wattatx power supply. stable again.

My sad story,
michael

As some of you know, I've got a TON of Amiga's and parts.  The problem is that I have yet to get a stable one built.  (well, there was one that is now gone, but that's a long sad story...)

What makes these systems go randomly bad with age?  No battery leakage on the ones I'm mainly trying.

Bill P. even knew how much trouble I have had and was nice enough to send me an awesome system that was no longer in use, but it is also suffering from old age since it was last used.  The Warp Engine 040 has ram errors if memory is installed and it seems to heat up and get progressively worse to the point it won't even boot from floppy.

What are you guys doing to keep them usable?

Is there anyone in the San Antonio area that would be willing to take a look in exchange for a boatload of Amiga hardware?  4000T's, bunch of 4000D's, 060 cards, 040 cards, PCI backplanes, I've got a pretty serious load of systems and good (well, costly...) parts I'm willing to give up if you can solve the problem.

All I want is a stable system (no hardware failure reboots, no disk errors) that I can develop on, but I just can't seem to make it happen.

[Heiroglyph]

@heiro
Two thoughts: As you mentioned the caps, and have you tested the power supplys?
I too, have a power tower with everything, the power supply was way too small...and old.

I bought a 4000 to atx power adaptor from amigakit and a 450 wattatx power supply. stable again.

My sad story,
michael

Thanks for the suggestion, but yes, after it acted strange I replaced the laughably overrated 300w with a known good (from PC use) 550W Antec.

I didn't see a difference but I felt better about it.

Hey, at least your story has a happy ending!

[freqmax]

As others said, check power supplies. And check capacitors everywhere! because they are the likely culprint in the power supplies too.

Contact oxide may also play a role with memory failures.

There might possible be cracks on PCB-to-chip connections.

[CaptainN]

I got your PM.  I will be happy to help out if I can.  I did the cap replacement job on my Amiga 600, and my 2 CD32's, and more often than not it did fix the problems I was having.

[Heiroglyph]

This was amazing timing!

I just got the remainder of a super secret local Amiga stash.  It was all going in the trash when cleaning out the warehouse and I went into panic mode

My wife will kill me when she gets home, but by God I saved them from destruction!

I wasn't in time to save to two A3000s that he thought weren't worth keeping though

So far I've picked up:
2 A4000T motherboards, one marked "bad 8520"
4 A4000's, mostly bare, no case tops
4 A2000's, motherboard and lower case
1 A2000 with bridgeboard (286 maybe?) and Flicker Fixer (lightly tested, seems good)
1 A2000 with CBM 030, GVP SCSI and some kickstart ROM switcher (drive barely spins, but seems functional)
1 CBM 030 for A2000
2 DataFlyer SCSI cards, in box (new?)
1 working 1084s
uncounted number of untested 1084's
1 1950, but I need an adapter to test it with
1 Toaster 4000
2 Toaster 2000's
Stacks of keyboards and misc. parts
and more stuff I don't even know yet.

I'll be keeping one of each model when I find them to be stable.

The rest of it I'm donating to good homes.  It will be shipping cost (including packing material) + $10 for my trouble, as is no guarantee, for any item.

Or pick up in person for free.

I'll post in marketplace what is available once I've got mine out of it, but don't you dare buy them to sell on ebay!

[ChaosLord]

I just got the remainder of a super secret local Amiga stash.

Or pick up in person for free.

Next hurricane, I'm staying at ur house!  

[Heiroglyph]

Come on down, it's turning into an Amiga warehouse over here.

So to update, one of the 4000T's runs but I haven't been able to check for disk errors or reboots yet because I've got no OS installed.

I think I've still got a SCSI drive specifically for a 4000T somewhere around here if I can find it.