SCSI woes. An A3000 with external CD-ROM

[AndyLandy]

So, my A3000 is coming along quite nicely, but one thing that's beginning to irk me is the lack of a CD-ROM drive. So, I thought I'd add one.

The internal scsi interface isn't working. I suspect there's probably some corrosion or broken tracks somewhere between the SCSI chip and the external header. I should look at that some day and advice on that is appreciated. However...

After upgrading the A4000, I have no need of keeping the Fastlane in there, so I've migrated that to the A3000. The extra 64MB FastRAM go quite nicely with the A3640 CPU card and it gives me a second SCSI interface to fiddle with. Thing is, I can't get the CD-ROM drive working.

I've actually got two external CD-RW drives floating about the place and both have been tested working successfully on the A1200 using a Squirrel SCSI. They're terminated properly and all of that sort of thing.

Thing is, neither of them wants to play ball. I've configured the CD0 DOSDriver and all is well until you put a CD in. The drive spins up, then the Amiga hangs and stays that way until you hit Ctrl+Amiga+Amiga

Running HDInstTools on the z3scsi.device is a bit weird. On one of the drives, it appears in the list seven times, occupying all of the SCSI IDs. The other one only appears as device 0. (Which is also odd, since both are configured to be SCSI ID 2).

The A3000 only has a Super Buster-9, but by all accounts that should work fine with the Fastlane. It's also an old revision Fastlane (2.1 I think) but I'm not aware of any caveats with that on a system of this configuration.

So, as per usual, any advice greatly appreciated!

 

[Merlin]

Hmm...

Have you terminated the chain after the CD-RW drive? It would help if you could tell us what the LUN, Termination Power and Termination settings are for each device, including the controller.

 

[lostrego]

@AndyLandy:

What kind of CD-ROM drive is it ?

I remember having similar troubles years ago with a Fastlane and a Plextor Ultraplex CD drive, that almost drove me mad...

It turned out to be that this CD-ROM drive's internal terminator did not terminate the scsi chain properly, so I solved it terminating the chain with any other device's internal termination (like a hard drive or such) or by using an external terminator attached directly to the ribbon cable or to the scsi pass-thru connector of the external case.

Just my two cents...

 

[AndyLandy]

They're both Yamaha CDRW drives. One is an old 6/4/4 one, the other is a 16/10/4 one. I'll fiddle about with termination and see how I get on. The chain is theoretically terminated correctly, but you never can be quite sure with dear old SCSI, can you?

 

[SpeedGeek]

I have a SCSI CDROM drive connected to my A3000's internal SCSI header via 50 pin cable. I routed the cable out the back thru one of top expansion board slots. Motherboard has termination packs installed, internal HD has termination disabled and CDROM drive has termination enabled. The mountlist has to correspond to the CDROM drives unit number.

I have no idea on what to do on the Fastlane Z3 except to suggest verifying this works with a SCSI HD before pursuing the CDROM drive.

 

[PymerOne]

Dear AndyLandy,

http://www.amiga-hardware.com/showhardware.cgi?HARDID=1231 awesome card!!!!
Buster and firmware requirements noted...as the card workerd in the other machine (by the way, does external work while card is in the other machine?) that might be ok.
Didnt see anything about card itself being terminated (thus locking out the external connector), does the card need external terminator when external is not used?
Is there a requirement for scsi id's like internal 0 through 6, card 7, external 8 through 16?

Grtz, PymerOne.

 

[Kawazu]

Treid to install a cd drive in my 3000T on the internal scsi connector.

And when everything was corectly installed and the software changes where made the damn thing locked up when i inserted a cd into the drive.

It did start again when i ejecte the cd and i could continue using the amiga, just like you press "paus" every time you insert a CD

The thing i did to fix this was to enable Term Power on the CD drive.
I have no termination what so ever on the cable, expect for the motherboard?

Everything is working like a charm now, had to do the same thing when i tried to use the cd drive with a 50->60 pin converter on my CS PPC

 

[Zetr0]

@Andy

At the point my friend I would connect up a CDROM on the FastLane connect it to the internal SCSI connector - see if you can get the drie seen and mounted there.

This will confrim if its a drive incompatability, I would also look at what SpeedGeek has done and taken an internal input and created an external connector for it.

 

[salaxi54]

(Which is also odd, since both are configured to be SCSI ID 2).

I must admit i got a little confused here! Do you mean two different drives connected simultaneously on the same controller, having the same ID? Or each one in different attempts? If both drives are utilizing the same SCSI ID and are both connected to the controller, you got yourself a conflict...

 

[Buzzfuzz]

Let's get a few things straight here on the internal SCSI for the A3000D/T.

They won't work with CD/DVDROM or RW without upgrading the WDC chip.
And they do need termination, best thing is:
Connector 3000D/T --- HDD --- CD/DVD ROM RW --- active terminator

Same goes for outside:
Connector 3000D/T --- HDD --- CD/DVD ROM RW DB25 --- active terminator on the external case!

And same goes for the Z3 Fastlane.

 

[merlinkv]

Is there a requirement for scsi id's like internal 0 through 6, card 7, external 8 through 16?

As I know FastSCSI-II can control up to 6 devices internal/external/mix, ID's 0 to 6 and controller normally is the ID6.

Andy, do you have one Active SE terminator? Sometimes the internal terminator of the devices don't work correctly....

 

[rkauer]

I think the problem lies in the card's termination because you see reflections when attaching an external CD.

Remove the termination packs from the card prior to use an external device, or use a cable to route the internal SCSI header to outside (passing by the unterminated HD).

Otherwise, people above told you some valuable information, too.

 

[AndyLandy]

Indeed, thanks to everyone who's offered advice so far. All being well, I'll have some time to have another fiddle later this week (I have a week off work!)

By the sounds of it, it probably is SCSI termination (Isn't it always?), so I'll have a play and see what I can do. I already know that I can plug an internal CD-ROM on the A3000's on-board SCSI chain, the problem there is that I can't then close the lid! I'll see how the Fastlane likes an internal drive.

How easy is it to remove the resistor packs from (a) the A3000 on-board SCSi and (b) the Fastlane? I'm surprised it's a requirement, I'd have thought a jumper setting at most.

 

[rkauer]

a) Depends heavily on the mobo revision, some are socketed, others are soldered...

b) See above. ;-)

 

[lostrego]

They're both Yamaha CDRW drives. One is an old 6/4/4 one, the other is a 16/10/4 one. I'll fiddle about with termination and see how I get on. The chain is theoretically terminated correctly, but you never can be quite sure with dear old SCSI, can you?

Who knows, my experience is that those plextor ultraplex drives don't terminate properly.

Just to sort other trouble spots, I remeber also some about internal terminator on 3 resitor packs on the fastlane itself which maybe (or maybe not, I can't recall) be removed if you want to use internal + external conectors at the same time with every chain terminated:

Say something like this:

term=(HD1)===(HD2)===[Fastlane]====(CD-ROM)====term
internal - External
​

(ugly ascii art, I know)

So, also Fastlane itself must be terminated if you use only one chain (say internal or external)

Ah those Fastlanes, nice hardware indeed, but... If you found yourself fighting with a Fastlane and also you are so obstinate to pack it with a hardrive, a cdrom which not terminates properly and an external terminator and all inside an already fully loaded Amiga 4000D case, not to mention those cumbersome 50 flat ribbon cables which have that "funny" tendency to got screwed with only a single twist...

Then you will understand why my Z3 Fastlane is now getting dust on a shelf for years.

I hope that you have better luck and mainly more patience than me