A4000T died :( (Blue Screen)

[fitzsteve]

Well my A4000T was obviously not happy that I gave it a few hours use on Monday because I went to switch it on today and it wont boot.

I just get a blue screen output through the scan doubler & RGB which I understand is custom chip fault. There's a lot of screen flickering so maybe the AGA chipset?

Where would be a good place to start?

I guess strip down and test the bare board in case another faulty component is causing it. But everything was working perfect up until this, as I said it got a few hours use earlier in the week and was flawless. Maybe I overworked it!! oh:

I'm wondering if anyone has had this with an A4000(D/T) and if they cured it & how?

For what it's worth I've got the following components hooked up to the T:

CSMkII 060
PicassoIV/Concierto/PalomaTV
X-Surf + Subway USB on Clockport
DKB3128

The Motherboard was re-capped by Hikey about 1 year ago, the PSU is quite new but I have a spare to test just in case.

Thanks for reading, I'll probably do the strip down tomorrow as the light in this house is poor!

Steve.

 

[ShambleS1980]

Cant help. but hope you catch a break soon.

 

[davideo]

Cant help. but hope you catch a break soon.

Nor can I but I guess the first step is to strip it down and see if it will work with the bare minimum connected.

Good luck Fitzy.

Dave G

 

[fitzsteve]

Cant help. but hope you catch a break soon.

Cheers, but I'm not too shocked - we're playing with 20 year old hardware it can go at any time

 

[ShambleS1980]

i wish you hadnt said that.. my "hardware" is older than 20 years, and if my wife sees what you said that would be a reason for her not to "play with it"icard

 

[cosmicfrog]

have you let it warm up a bit first, am always surprised how much of my kit wont boot first time but after a while its all good

 

[fitzsteve]

have you let it warm up a bit first, am always surprised how much of my kit wont boot first time but after a while its all good

I left it on for a few mins and the flickering got worse, I was worried about doing further damage so turned it off.

Heat up is normally capacitor related no? This has all new caps.

I'm trying to stop myself tearing the tower apart tonight...

 

[BlindGerMan]

Good luck my friend!!!

 

[amigaman2000]

Hi Steve

I have a similar problem with my Amiga 4000T, CS MKII 060, PicassoIV, Deneb and Catweasell MK3, the problem was related with a bad connection between Picasso IV board and Zorro slot, try to reseat the Picasso IV and try again

Regards

 

[fitzsteve]

I just pulled all the Zorro boards and it's working again, maybe a bad connection with the PicassoIV as you say amigaman2000...

I wouldn't mid re-seating boards occasionally but the A4000T is the worst Amiga to work on oh:

I'm leaving it running some Quake in a loop for a while then will give her a rest, try and again and then re-build...

(Right now there are no Zorro boards connected, just the MkII 060)

Wish me luck!

---------- Post added at 19:31 ---------- Previous post was at 18:49 ----------

Well it ran for a while and was fine so I re-installed the PicassoIV and she's still fine...

Hmmm

 

[BlindGerMan]

Congratulations!

 

[johnim]

glad shes working again stevo prob just a dodgy zorro slot

 

[Hivernaal]

Don't know if you changed the caps but think about it. The caps of the boards too.
If you need some help.

 

[Tahoe]

Actually, this is partly the fault of the casing. I have found that cards do tend to pry themselfs (partially) out of their slots in the original 4000T casing. I have seen this happen with the disk and AV modules too; in which case the machine won't work either.
I wouldn't have expected it to be the Picasso IV though, because of it's connection to both the video and Zorro slots it should sit quite firmly. Just goes to show

Anyway, good to hear it's working again!

 

[lostrego]

Dodgy zorro slots and a PicassoIV combination is a pure nightmare, I think mainly is due to the Picasso IV that seems to be a very mechanically compromised design.

I've suffered this on my 40000D in the past, on the D its easy to cure just simply replace the daughter board and go ahead bot on the T is a bit of more drama. Have you considered to change the dodgy slots ? massive desoldering a soldering must be done though but may be its deserves a try as the 4000Ts are nice machines and they deserve the effort .

BTW is that the same 4000T that you already had issues with a highway ?

 

[fitzsteve]

Well back up and running and posting from the A4000T, Network, USB, RTG all wotking again!

I guess in the long term resoldering or replacing the zorro slots for new is the way forward as since the rebuild my flicker fixer AGA output is screwed up...

Otherwise all working...

Until the next time!!!
IBrowse/2.4 (AmigaOS 3.9; 68K)

---------- Post added at 20:44 ---------- Previous post was at 20:40 ----------

BTW is that the same 4000T that you already had issues with a highway ?

Yeah it is the same A4000T so must be the issue. The zorro cards have been swapped around lots over the years, it was well used by the last user as well, x-ray who is very active over at Amiga.org had this one before me. I gather he used it a lot over the years.
IBrowse/2.4 (AmigaOS 3.9; 68K)

 

[lostrego]

Glad to see you get it working again.

W

BTW is that the same 4000T that you already had issues with a highway ?

Yeah it is the same A4000T so must be the issue. The zorro cards have been swapped around lots over the years, it was well used by the last user as well, x-ray who is very active over at Amiga.org had this one before me. I gather he used it a lot over the years.
IBrowse/2.4 (AmigaOS 3.9; 68K)

Yep I told you that as very same thing happened to me with my 4000D, worn slots and a Picasso IV, It was more a black magic matter to get it going properly than anything else, that involved shaking the Picasso IV a bit on the backplate area (that used to cure interferences on the FF) , pulling it out of the slot a bit (a millimeter or two) out of the zorro & video slot to get the card working properly as it don't liked to be fully inserted and things like these :roll: icard.

Also a Fastlane that I used in the past only liked and seemed to be happy on one specific slot but not the rest, a true big box Amiga experience.

Thankfully replacing the daughter solved that issues forever, so there is hope for a future refurb of the slots of your 4000T.

 

[protek]

These ladies are temperamental. You have to be nice to them.

 

[sneeker]

MY pc did something similar before Christmas, turned it on and it didn't post..
Removed all the cards and the ram, unplugged any usb and it posted, but all the cards back in, and it is still working now.

So it even happens with new(ish) hardware.

 

[mjnurney]

Brilliant news steve , was the video card coming out and the Amiga posting to rgb / composite?

I'd clean all the edge connectors in ipa and haves good look at the zorro slots



Mike