Help! Amiga 3000 video issue

[chfriend]

I used it yesterday and it was fine and today I turn it on and all I get is what's shown in the video (flashing colored bars).  The computer is still booting, but I can't see anything on the screen.  I've tried reseating all of the chips on the motherboard and removing the Cybervision 64 card but no luck.

http://youtu.be/39QbjjjYZcw

The Cybervision displays if I turn on my external CD-drive and stop the CDFS error from appearing, so it's apparently an Amber problem.  Any ideas what to check first?

[Zac67]

Checked your battery lately?

Might just be a sync issue. 15 kHz output still working?

[VingtTrois]

Check you Monitor and PSU but these flashing colored bars are very strange for an A3000!!!

[chfriend]

It starts clearing up after the machine has been on for a couple of minutes.  I actually have to power the monitor off and on as it clears to get it to resync.  I know other 3000's have this issue, any idea what components cause it?  Bad capacitor?

Edit: It doesn't stay that way, the color jumble eventually comes back.  From bringing up the monitor's control panel while it's up, I can see that it's detecting a 31KHz H / 59.9Hz V signal, which is correct.  I do not have any monitor that can accept a 15KHz signal.

[chfriend]

I pulled the Indivision out of my 2000 and stuck it in the 3000 to get 31khz video back, but if anyone can shed any light on what might be causing this as far as caps, etc... please let me know.

[nscaleworld]

This is a common problem on Amiga 3000 computers. The cause is battery leakage damaging the traces, corosion in the Denise or Amber IC sockets. The larger caps around the video circuitry could be going bad, or the Commodore Custom Video chip (near Amber) may be bad. I do not recommend installing boards in an Amiga 3000 computer, because the stock power supply is only 135 watts. Even though an Amiga 3000 has expansion slots, it was never really designed to be expanded. Commodore designed the Amiga 3000D as a graphics workstation. At the time, it had the most popular expansions as part of the motherboard- a proccessor board, a memory expansion board, a SCSI controller board, and a FF/SD board all on the motherboard. Commodore never intended for people to actually expand the computer further. When you do, you start having all kinds of problems. I have NEVER had any problems with a STOCK Amiga 3000. Add a graphics board and you will start having problems. BTW, most Amiga software does not need a graphics board, and many people install one because of pure ego.

[Zac67]

My 3k has been crammed (nearly) full for over a decade w/o problems. You need to watch the power and heat though, as you mentioned.

[matt3k]

Seems like amber has failed.  Strange never seen it fail like that, the biggest issues I have found with 3000's have been with battery damage to denise where artifacts appear or the dreaded green screen from chip ram/agnes fails (again all from battery damage). I would pickup a new amber and try it out, it may be another component but ambers are cheap to try.  

The Stock 3k power supply is fine for a maxed out system, my 3k has had all card slots full for 20 plus years.

The main 3 things any 3k user should do is, never let the battery leak, keep the cooling system clean, and make sure it has good airflow (keeping it slightly elevated on the 4 rubber legs help a good bit.).  Feel the bottom after it has run awhile.

Sadly all the 3k's I have come across to fix and sell have had battery leakage.

[chfriend]

I'll have the find my PLCC chip puller, maybe Amber needs a reseat.  This did not seem like the dreaded battery screen corruption, and it does occasionally work for short periods of time, some a bad Amber or failing capacitor (or heaven forbid, a bad RAM chip in the Amber circuit) seems to be the cause.

[Terse]

This is a common problem on Amiga 3000 computers. The cause is battery leakage damaging the traces, corosion in the Denise or Amber IC sockets. The larger caps around the video circuitry could be going bad, or the Commodore Custom Video chip (near Amber) may be bad. I do not recommend installing boards in an Amiga 3000 computer, because the stock power supply is only 135 watts. Even though an Amiga 3000 has expansion slots, it was never really designed to be expanded. Commodore designed the Amiga 3000D as a graphics workstation. At the time, it had the most popular expansions as part of the motherboard- a proccessor board, a memory expansion board, a SCSI controller board, and a FF/SD board all on the motherboard. Commodore never intended for people to actually expand the computer further. When you do, you start having all kinds of problems. I have NEVER had any problems with a STOCK Amiga 3000. Add a graphics board and you will start having problems. BTW, most Amiga software does not need a graphics board, and many people install one because of pure ego.

Hi Doomy!!

[Motormouth]

It starts clearing up after the machine has been on for a couple of minutes.  I actually have to power the monitor off and on as it clears to get it to resync.  I know other 3000's have this issue, any idea what components cause it?  Bad capacitor?

Edit: It doesn't stay that way, the color jumble eventually comes back.  From bringing up the monitor's control panel while it's up, I can see that it's detecting a 31KHz H / 59.9Hz V signal, which is correct.  I do not have any monitor that can accept a 15KHz signal.

You have a time dependent change in your video
Sounds like the capacitors to me.....

[Motormouth]

BTW, most Amiga software does not need a graphics board, and many people install one because of pure ego.

Actually I like having my graphics boards, particularly in OCS/ECS amigas.  More colors, faster, higher resolution, more possible display frequencies.  If this is ego then I guess I have an ego.  WB is so much nicer with 8bit or hicolor.

However I can see your point if you use Amiga OS 3.1 or older, use only older pre(AGA) software, and only have a 15.75 or 31.5 Khz monitor and/or play only games.

[mechy]

This is a common problem on Amiga 3000 computers. The cause is battery leakage damaging the traces, corosion in the Denise or Amber IC sockets. The larger caps around the video circuitry could be going bad, or the Commodore Custom Video chip (near Amber) may be bad. I do not recommend installing boards in an Amiga 3000 computer, because the stock power supply is only 135 watts. Even though an Amiga 3000 has expansion slots, it was never really designed to be expanded. Commodore designed the Amiga 3000D as a graphics workstation. At the time, it had the most popular expansions as part of the motherboard- a proccessor board, a memory expansion board, a SCSI controller board, and a FF/SD board all on the motherboard. Commodore never intended for people to actually expand the computer further. When you do, you start having all kinds of problems. I have NEVER had any problems with a STOCK Amiga 3000. Add a graphics board and you will start having problems. BTW, most Amiga software does not need a graphics board, and many people install one because of pure ego.

I couldn't resist replying to this. That is the most ridiculous thing i have ever heard.. you must be doomy. 135W psu is plenty for quite a few expansions cards.The point that it DOES have expansion slots is why it is meant to be expanded. I have run many 3000's loaded with cards for many years with no troubles. as long as you keep it at a reasonable temperature its fine.
If anything many 3000's came with buster 7' chips which didnt support working zorro3 (you need buster9 or 11).

Ego? are you serious. gfx cards were useful for 24 bit stuff, many people wanted to see 24bit pics,surf the net in 24bit. It was a great improvement over slow ecs.

You can't really believe this silly nonsense you spread!

Mech

[lost_loven]

ummm Ditto .. what Mechy and motormouth says.



lost

[nscaleworld]

The following Amiga models can be expanded, because they have a beefy enough power supply:
 

• Amiga 2000
• Amiga 3000T
• Amiga 4000T

The following Amiga models should not be expanded, because of their low wattage power supply:
 

• Amiga 3000 (135w psu)
• Amiga 4000 (140w psu)

If you do decide to upgrade these Amiga models, by installing expansion boards, then the power supply really should be upgraded.