Apple IIe Platinum... DEAD! Advice Please

[Charlie]

So what's the worst language I can use on Amibay and not get a ban?

While debugging my attempt at a Mockingboard clone: oddly the computer boots to the monitor if plugged in to slot 4 so I thought I'd just try the other slots... with the same result until I got to slot 7.

Beep, beep... No floppy seek, garbage on screen. Oops, quickly power off, out with card, try again...

Beep, beep... Large multicoloured blocks on screen, no other response. (Rude words of your choice here)

So I reseated / replaced all socketed ICs, including 6502, that aren't Apple branded & no dice. (More rude words)

As an aside the power LED next to the PSU comes on, but the LED on the opposite side of the motherboard doesn't any more. (I believe an indicator to report 6502 has finished boot successfully​?)

Having tried booting with no cards installed, same result. Pulling the 'extra 64k' card for HiRes modes (whatever it's called) resulted in a grey screen and no life at all, but for power LED.
Nothing's warm to touch.

I'm guessing as I popped something by plugging a dodgy card in to a slot I'm not the first person to kill a IIe this way, with this result. Can anyone suggest what I most likely killed?

Please say it sounds like a RAM chip (my best theory so far) or some bus logic, and not a custom IC that I'll have the devil's own time replacing! (My second theory is I may have popped the character ROM)

Any advice would be most welcome - I've already grown rather fond of this computer and this has rather put a damper on my developing stuff for it.

Many thanks in advance.

 

[iainjh]

Hi charlie,
Sorry for the ness but hope it's only temporary!

I can't help directly but understand our apples are pretty much always repairable. Someone will be along v soon to offer help I'm sure...

good luck !

 

[tbtorro]

I had garbage screen problem (the machine booted though) before due faulty RAM chips. It was on a II - not sure if the RAM is socketed on the platinum though. Usually I just take a known good chip and swap the others one by one to find the faulty chip.

 

[iainjh]

I'd just send it to bas thecorfiot tbh. He has quite the technique. Plus iie's to swap bits out
of to narrow it down. He fixed one of mine in about 20 mins once.

 

[Charlie]

Thanks for the words of encouragement chaps. I might just go pester Bas for some advice.

 

[protek]

Have you checked Applefritter for reference?

 

[Charlie]

Have you checked Applefritter for reference?

I'm still very new to Apple stuff, shall certainly have a look, thanks.

Epilogue:
Sometimes I wonder if electronic devices have an evil sense of humour and enjoy plopping all over my plans? Having put Apple II projects on the back burner for the moment I decided to finish soldering up my first batch of Aikon boards having just received the last of the components...
...all good, out with the ISP programmer attached to old laptop I keep for it's legacy ports and 32bit OS. And it died!
Ok, plug ISP programmer in to Media PC and go find some 64 bit drivers... Found, but won't install on Windows 10 because it doesn't like the digital rights certificate... Quick Google to solve that, and just I as sort that the bl**dy thing also ups and dies too!
Grr, I think I'll go do some practice before my singing lesson... Oh no, I can't. The tablet I keep my music on won't boot!

 

[Bryce]

The first thing I'd do is grab a meter and see if the PSU is still putting out the voltages it should be. It's very dificult to damage anything on the mainboard just by plugging a dodgy card in, but very likely that you damaged the PSU if the card had a short. Which would also mean just sending the PSU to Baz and not the whole computer.

Bryce.

 

[Charlie]

Ah-ha!
Thanks Bryce, yes I should consider the PSU... Indeed I've got a IIe -> IIgs motherboard which will suit the IIe PSU. Should do for a quick test and maybe save much faffing with the IIe motherboard.
They say every cloud has a silver lining... I've been eyeing the puny output on my IIe's PSU. Maybe this is the impetus to do an upgrade.

 

[TheCorfiot]

Hi Charles

I have quite a few spare Apple II PSU Units 240V, If yours is duff I will just send you a replacement.

If it is indeed your Board that has failed then just send me the Motherboard for repair...

Don't forget if the keyboard is unconnected or not sensed the system will always boot to self Test mode which is lots of grey squares on the screen (or colour if NTSC board)

Bas

 

[Charlie]

Hi Bas,
Just tried my IIe PSU with my IIe/gs motherboard and working fine. Nice to know my PSU seems ok, less fine that I guess I really did pop my motherboard somehow. I think I know what happened to cause it: My prototype sound card had a bunch of caps strapped across some ICs and I think I shorted it across to my floppy card in slot 6 - I do hope I haven't killed that too, I guess I can go try it in my IIgs to find out.
Interesting you mention about big coloured blocks on the screen if the keyboard isn't recognised. That sounds like a good description of what my screen shows... I wonder if that gives a hint as to what I may have popped.
As an aside this darn mockingboard clone is proving more hassle to get working than I expected, it's really not that complicated but proving harder to get working than I thought. I might post the latest iteration of my schematic to see if anyone can spot what I'm doing wrong.

Thanks for the offer of help old chap, I really appreciate it. Expect a pm shortly.

 

[TheCorfiot]

And Charlie's iie is now back in the land of the living

I will let him tell you what he did lol, there is a lesson here to be learnt by all

 

[Charlie]

And Charlie's iie is now back in the land of the living

I will let him tell you what he did lol, there is a lesson here to be learnt by all

Hi Bas,
Thank you very much indeed!

I look forward to our next conversation with keen anticipation.

 

[Charlie]

Well, my IIe motherboard has been off to the most excellent Bas, and returned a few days ago as it happens... Today is the first opportunity I've had put the whole thing back together.

The good news:
-My IIe is fully working again, many, many thanks!
It seems, after much fruitless troubleshooting, the problem was a bit of wire that has gotten in to Slot 7 as a result of my untidy habbits and shorted out the bus. Oops!
-The latest version of my attempted Mockingboard clone came back from the fab house, so full of excitement I soldered it up, banged it in Slot 4 and powered up...
...hurrah! No issues this time. Time to go load up some software and test out my creation.

The bad news:
-Powering up with the floppy drive attached sees no life from the drive and multicoloured squares on screen.
Did I fry my floppy card? The drive? I'm guessing the drive is the primary suspect as my IIgs won't boot with it attached having been fine with it in the past.

*Sigh*
Retro computing geekery can be a cruel mistress at times, especially when I'm too messy in my habbits.

Epilogue:
Iain kindly sent me some Apple II FDDs a little while back (many thanks again!) but they are the ribbon cable type and my FDD card doesn't have that connector, bum! I feel a rewiring job comming on if the issue with my dead FDD isn't straightforward.

Oh-well, the advantage of having many unfinished projects on the boil is there's always something else. Piccies of my latest Atari 800XL upgrades shortly, assuming I can track down the thread.

PS
Having swapped the cables between FDDs it seems I've fried the controller card too!

 

[iainjh]

Its all going on isn't it!

you can borrow my floppy controller if it helps Charlie, luckily they aren't very expensive to replace... but of course I don't know how's youd exactly confignthat on the gs. Hmm

in the meantime congrats re the mockingchick, if you feel like engineering a duel or triple slot 7 adaptor be my guest

( ps looking forward to the 800xl thread! Love the 800's... I've just added a uav to mine ( video upgrade)-mostly the same as the ultra video mod that's floating around. )

 

[Charlie]

Thanks for the sympathy & offer...
...going to try my card in my gs just to check. If really dead I'll likely get another off the otherBay... I'll have something to test the dead one against.

No doubt there will be other projects. Um, if you're looking for mowar slots for your II how's the PSU holding up?

C.

 

[iainjh]

They seem a pretty affordable board thank goodness. Anyway the offer still stands if it helps.

Psu seems happy with all 7 slots and ram full up, inc a z80 card and the pi card. And two drives.


As far as a I can tell! It's a iie psu with a later platinum motherboard.

Can't recall if bas did the caps on this one..

 

[Charlie]

Right, I have a replacement Disk II interface on the way. The same model as the one I think I cooked, but I have some remaining doubted about my IIe...

Turn on, boots to a screen of multicoloured squares with Disk II card in slot, boots to ] prompt without... Most of the time.
Along with my IIgs not booting with this card I've taken this to mean it's the Disk II card is at fault...
...but I still get the occasional multicoloured squares on boot, and always if I CTRL-Reset on boot. New behavior.
Ok, old / abused computer, more flakey than it used to be..?

I still want to know if my Mockingboard clone works, so I set up my Superserial card in slot 3, attached to PC via serial-usb adaptor, with the intention of using VFS mode in ADTPro...
...but I can't get it to work!
-ADTPro is happy with it's end of the connection
-Type IN#3 <Return> at the ] prompt
-<CTRL-A>... No APPLE SSC: prompt
Type 14B <Return> ... Syntax Error
...not as the ADTPro instructions suggest!

Ok, CTRL-Reset, try again, same result although occ screen of multicoloured squares. If I CTRL-Reset on boot I always get multicoloured squares (new behavior), same for every slot but if I try my SSC in slot 6 I get a blank screen with randomly scattered random character.
More worryingly the two ICs top-right on my SSC get very warm.

Stuck now, worried my IIe is both malfunctioning and damaging inserted cards!

Thoughts would be much appreciated.

 

[iainjh]

Multicoloured squares doesn't sound right. Not seen that before.

re the superserial, some respond to 14b, others respond to different codes. Also the dipswitches vary from the manual. Did u get this one from me sorry can't recall what was in the box! If so are the dipswitches as I left them?

control break
In#2

I think I read somewhere slot 2 is expected for super serial...

control a Definitely brings up the ssc prompt here.

try slot 2?

 

[Charlie]

Hi Iain,
Yes, the card you kindly sent me. The dip switches are set as per the ADTPro website, I believe they were all set on (or off?) before I fiddled.
I tried reseating all the socketed ICs, replacing the 6551 and other ICs I had replacements for, no dice.
By feel I'd guess there's a 2k EPROM under the Apple part number lable, I'll probably pull it and check the contents against what's on the 'net and reblow it if it turns out my little adventure has borked the contents.

Looking for info I see someone on applefritter had the same issue and it turned out to be a dodgy reset key... But that would be one hell of a coincidence if mine only just decided to pack up now.

I'm away on holiday for a couple of weeks so frustratingly it will have to fester. And when I believe I'm so close to having a working MockngChick too!

Thanks for the ideas, do keep them coming if you have more.

I guess it serves me right for having such messy soldering habbits!