»

[Dragster]

Hi, well, it doesn't boot... it shows a grey screen and then that one changes for a lighter grey (almost white I'd dare to say), then it seems it repeats that sequence again and again... I've no idea what could be wrong with it, I have it barebones now. I connected a 3640 to it (the 3640 board is OK) and it doesn't show that sequence, just what it seems to be a blue (dark blue.., might be dark grey) and it does nothing... :-(

I've tried reseating some chips, the kickstart and such, pushed some of the chips just to make sure they're placed firmly on the board... cleaned it up a bit using isopropyl alcohol. The battery had leaked, so I removed it and cleaned the area, it doesn't seem to be major damage to the board.

Any ideas on what could be wrong with it? Has this ever happened to anybody?

Any help will be greatly appreciated, thanks!

D.

[Tenacious]

Mine does the same thing if the Zorro III daughter card has been jolted or disturbed. I always have to clean, reseat it several times.

[Dragster]

@Tenacious

Does it work OK if you remove the daughterboard? 'cause my tests are being done without the daughterboard installed, it does the same with it installed though.

D.

[dannyp1]

Mine won't boot without the daughterboard installed. I found that out through trial and error. Are you booting from a hard-drive? If so try and boot fom a diskette.

Dan

[Dragster]

@Dannyp1

I don't have anything connected to it, not even the floppy drive, it's only the motherboard... I was expecting the disk load animation... but nothing... I'll try to clean the daughterboard and connect it back to see if that makes a difference.

What do yours do when you power it on without the daughterboard installed?

Thanks!

D.

[davideo]

@Dragster

Have a look here http://amiga.serveftp.net/A3000_HardwareGuide/booting-problems.html

It gives you all (perhaps not quite all) of the boot sequence and problems - especially the screen colour codes

Dave G 8-)

[Dragster]

@Davideo

Great resource mate, I'm gonna see if there's something that works for me.

Thanks

D.

[Boot_WB]

@Dragster

You may want to try without the A3640 too, I believe that some versions of this processor board do not work too well with the A3000, especially if using DMAC rev2.

Regards



Rich

[Gwion]

Change the Jumper to VSYNC not TIC (it worked for me)

[rkauer]

Sounds like a bad PSU to me.

Measure the voltages levels. And, like Gwion said, disable the PSU tick signal.

I have an A2000 with this very same behaviour (grey, light grey, restart), and the PSU was faulty. Swapped for an AT PSU with a DIY tick generator (by aminet).

[weirdami]

I heard that it won't boot without the daughter card.

[Dragster]

@Boot_WB

Yeah, i tried without the 3640... same behavior... I even tried using a CSMKII, same behavior, though the display shows the rainbow when the machine is turned on...

Thanks!

[Dragster]

@Gwion

Thanks for the advise, I tried it, it didn't work... :-(

[Dragster]

@Weirdami

Yeah, I connected the daughterboard back, but it didn't help much...

Thanks!

D.

[Dragster]

@rkauer

Sounds like a bad PSU to me.

Measure the voltages levels. And, like Gwion said, disable the PSU tick signal.

Thanks! I'll do the measurements... as soon as I get a voltmeter handy :-)

I have an A2000 with this very same behaviour (grey, light grey, restart), and the PSU was faulty. Swapped for an AT PSU with a DIY tick generator (by aminet).

Really? Interesting... now I'm getting somewhere.

I don't have a voltmeter handy at the moment, however I did another simple test... :

I thought the floppy drive did not work, it didn't do click even when I started the machine on, so I connected it to my A4000 and it turns out it works, so my test was to connect the drive (data cable only) to the A4000, and then connect it to the A3000's PSU... I turned the 3000's PSU on, and then I turned the A4000 on, and voila... it didn't work! Then I did the same test with an AT PSU, and the floppy worked... what does this mean? Something's wrong with the A3000's PSU, yeah!

I still hope the machine is OK, I'm going to test the PSU extensively and do some measurements... I'll keep ya posted,

thanks for all your help.

D.