Famous Amiga 500 black tower - The resurrection

[haywirepc]

http://www.amiga.org/gallery/index.php?n=3329

I got  this by chance some time ago. It was in storage for ages.

http://www.amiga.org/gallery/index.php?n=3328

See that hand wired to expansion on the bottom? I believe thats a gvp 40mhz 030 accellerator with 8mb ram and scsi.

When I got the tower, the hard drive was not plugged in (But the tape drive and cdrom were)

Anyhow, I don't know much about scsi, but I tried plugging any of the drive cables (of the 7 in the chain) to the hard drive. It would not boot from hard drive on any that would reach. I don't know much about scsi, can someone tell me how to terminate or tell it the hard drive is the only device? And which of the 7 should the hard drive go on if I only want the hard drive?

I believe there is something wrong with the expansion card. Its suppose to have 8mb of ram onboard but when it boots from floppy, it says 847,544 graphics mem 0 other mem.

Also if I hold both mouse buttons down and reboot, it does not see the device under expansions (shouldn't it?)

Looks like someone hand wired this line by line to be able to sit on the bottom of the case. If I had to guess... I'd say that was probably the cause of the problem but I can't really get in there to continuity test each line.

I'm going to try taking the exapsion out (The regular connector is still there) and seeing if it will work on a regular 500...

Any other suggestions? I'd love to get this current expansion working....

When I got it... It would not boot at all. At least now its booting from a floppy I suppose. PROGRESS!

Also, worst case scenario I will have to toss this gvp card and perhaps but something else. Does anyone make any kind of right angle adapter or flexible cable extender for the amiga 500 side port? I'm going to be hard pressed to fit something in there if its not mounted at a 90% angle like this current setup.
I don't think hand soldering each connection is a good idea...

If I can't get this working...
Maybe I could do the add ide thing I've heard about and an accelerator that plugs into the 68000 socket? Kinda cool big old tower. I'd like to put it into use... I really like it but leaving it a stock speed 500 in a tower with no hard drive? um... no.

[haywirepc]

I have successfully removed the gvp card and tested it on a regular amiga 500... No go. Oh I'm so sad...

I don't see any obvious problems on the board. tried reseating all socketed chips... Still no go in either 500....

I am at least assuming if the amiga workbench does not see the device (or the ram) then something is borked...

Anyone want to trade one non working gvp 040mhz 030 accellerator/8mb ram/scsi 286 bridgeboard card for a mega midget racer, add ide or anything else I may find useful in the ressurection?

Does someone have a link for add ide?

[Jeff]

I may still have some of my old A500T hand made parts. I might be interested in the borked GVP 030 - 286 boards. I have a Working Mtec 68020/4 meg board right here. I also have some other stuff as I am cleaning up and sorting right now.

No 030+ boards though. Let me know if you want to work out a swap of some sort.

-Jeff

[haywirepc]

Jeff sure that would be great...

Not looking to make it a speed demon. Mostly I just want it to have a bit more ram and hard drive, a bit faster than stock would be good. maybe add a scandoubler.

Someone else messed with this thing alot. This gvp may well work but need jumper settings right or something like that. I recall back in the day having a similar one and you needed to jumper for your revision a500 board...

[QuikSanz]

Don't give up so quickly, Have at it like on a mission. Say: "You no good so an so I'm the boss" and make the darn thing work like it should!

[haywirepc]

Hey man I tried, cleaned all contacts, checked for bad traces, cleaned whole board, cleaned power connectors, multi-tested power (thats working) cleaned and cleaned again. I suspect its a short in this ghetto home made extension cable somewhere. But that means desoldering the whole thing and cleaning all contacts, which would make it usable again(I think!) on a regular 500 but not very usable here (I'm not hand soldering all those lines again!)

Looks like aca 500 may have just enough room to fit in there... Hard to judge from the pics I've seen. Or a 68000 socket based accelerator and add ide. So YES I will get it working again, one way or the other, just not with this kind of ridiculous set up...

ACA 500 with 2 compact flash cards (System and work) running classic workbench, whdload and a whole slew of hd installed demos and apps would be sweet! Looks like it just MAY fit in there. Can someone with an ACA 500 measure it and let me know its dimensions? I'm pretty sure if that fits the add on aca1200 accellerators will fit!

Steven

[Matt_H]

The A530 has a disable switch that deactivates just about everything on it - SCSI, RAM, 030. It sounds like that switch may have been inadvertently set to "Off".

[haywirepc]

Does anyone have a manual for this? That may be it! I looked, I don't see any switch anywhere on the board but remember this was removed from the case to be installed in this tower... I see lots of jumpered and un jumpered jumpers on the board though. There may have been a jumper that went to the switch on the case?

[Matt_H]

Does anyone have a manual for this? That may be it! I looked, I don't see any switch anywhere on the board but remember this was removed from the case to be installed in this tower... I see lots of jumpered and un jumpered jumpers on the board though. There may have been a jumper that went to the switch on the case?

Yes, DLH has a scan of the manual. It looks like J2 should be closed to enable everything. See p29 of the PDF (p48 of the original).

[haywirepc]

Matt You may have just cracked this case. J2 is OPEN!

It may have been connected at some point to the turbo buttons on the case...

I've had a few too many pints to work on this more tonight but I'll investigate fully in the morning and let you know.

THANKS MATE! That may be it!

Steven

[Jeff]

This would be to cool!

Keep us posted.

[haywirepc]

I have to go through some old pc cards I have in my dungeon of doom and find a pin I can use to jumper that jumper and try it again in both 500's...

I'm crossing my fingers that will work... If the faster cpu and ram get seen all I have to do after that is redo this scsi chain nightmare and I'll have a pretty capable machine!

Excited that it may be not dead yet! Thanks for the people here. What a great community of amiga enthusiasts. I have seen people here help guys time and time again get old classics running again.

This old beast should get rebuilt proper. One way or another I will...

Steven

P.S. for all I know the builder of this orginally made it so you had to hit the turbo button for it to work with the accelerator so he could run old floppy games on the original cpu. I don't know... But we'll find out tomorrow...

[Jeff]

P.S. for all I know the builder of this orginally made it so you had to hit the turbo button for it to work with the accelerator so he could run old floppy games on the original cpu. I don't know... But we'll find out tomorrow...

That sure does make sense. That's probably how I would have set it up. I'll send you the Mtec 020 board if your 030 doesn't work and you can try that.

[haywirepc]

Awesome Jeff. Thank you so much. One way or another the "famous black amiga 500 tower" will rise again!

I remember feeling kind of privileged to get this. I also remember feeling a sense of responsibility to make this work to be put on display for amiga conventions and such again. It needs to be alive. Thanks to anyone helping me make that happen!

One way or another, the famous black amiga 500 tower will rise again!

Steven

[haywirepc]

Well it looks like attaching the jumper did not help. In fact, with the jump attached, neither a500 would boot at all...

ARGH. So sad I can't make this work! I tried new ram, reseating chips, cleaning connections.... I EVEN READ THE MANUAL! no go.