Compatibility with Phoenix board: ACA500+ & ACA1233n[55] ?

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Don't Panic. Please wash hands.
  • Hi,


    has anyone tested the ACA500+ with an ACA1233n before with a Phoenix board?

    I am aware that the platform is not the best system and does have its quirks.


    On my system, the ACA500 works perfectly. Everything is fine.


    A bit surprising for me, the ACA1233n does not work.

    With an ACA1233n attached, the following happens:

    - most of the times, the DisMo will disply "E0"

    - the screen of the system shows some memory dumps

    - when wiggling a bit on the cards, sometimes I see the ACA500+ start screen and can, for example, enter the F10 expert screen

    - if the system makes it to the F10 screen, the ACA1233 is shown

    - the system then won't boot but either stay at a black screen or will show the kick screen "Insert disk", even with a floppy disk drive attached

    - rarely, the system will boot with the 68030 from the 1233n active into workbench

    - if booting into workbench, the Indivision ECS V2 shows only half the lines. After a few seconds, the system freezes. The 128MB of the ACA1233n are shown in the workbench menu.



    Questions:

    1) is it reasonable to assume that the main issue could be the PSU? Especially the fact that sometimes some things work seema to indicate a weak PSU to me. Its the original A1000 PSU from back then :) ?


    2) what bothers me a bit is that wiggling makes a difference. The ACA1233n connector seems a bit loose to me. But that might be perception. How strong should the card stay in place?


    3) anyone else already tried an ACA(500/1233/...) with a Phoenix board?


    4) ist is possible to only use the expansions of the ACA500+ (Clockport, ethernet, IDE) and keep an internal accelerator?


    Thanks,

    McTrinsic

  • has anyone tested the ACA500+ with an ACA1233n before with a Phoenix board?

    I hope not, as the ACA500plus was designed for use with an A500 only.


    when wiggling a bit on the cards, sometimes I see the ACA500+ start screen

    Sounds like a contact problem. Pull the card back a little, maybe by 1mm, and give it proper support, as it's floating high in the air in that non-recommended configuration.


    if booting into workbench, the Indivision ECS V2 shows only half the lines.

    Picture, please, as "half" can be interpreted in numerous ways.

    is it reasonable to assume that the main issue could be the PSU? Especially the fact that sometimes some things work seema to indicate a weak PSU to me. Its the original A1000 PSU from back then :) ?

    The A1000 PSU is pretty good in terms of both ripple and regulation. AFAIR, it's 5V and 8A, which is plenty. As long as the PSU is not defective (leaked caps after all these years), I would not expect it to be the source of the problem.

    what bothers me a bit is that wiggling makes a difference. The ACA1233n connector seems a bit loose to me. But that might be perception. How strong should the card stay in place?

    The connector is not made to "carry" the card. It is bent way too far if just hanging in the air, which ultimately damages the connector. As a result, it will appear even more loose. Once again, it must be supported mechanically.


    ist is possible to only use the expansions of the ACA500+ (Clockport, ethernet, IDE) and keep an internal accelerator?

    No. The ACA500plus takes over the bus, and requires the A500 to have nothing installed on the 68000 socket - this is clearly written in the manual.


    The Phoenix board has a lot of extras, which load the bus heavily. The ACA500plus does not have extra bus drivers, as they are not required on a vanilla A500, which is was developed for. So what you can do is to reduce bus load:


    - remove all ROMs. The ACA500plus will start without ROMs present on the main board.

    - remove extra chips - I believe the board can be jumpered to have no SCSI and little-to-no extra autoconfig boards.

    - remove the CPU - yes, keep the socket empty

    - close the solder-jumper on the ACA500plus - that's near the inner corner where the A1200 accelerator is connected, very close to U24. The jumper is labelled "close jumper if 68000 removed".


    After closing that solder-jumper, make sure to NEVER EVER connect the ACA500plus to an Amiga that has the 68000 CPU connected. It will either damage the 68000, or the ACA500plus.


    Needless to say that you're doing all this at your own risk. Only do these modifications if you have the required experience, skill and tools. I can't be held resposible for operating my products way outside their intended environment.

  • Hi Jens,


    thanks a lot for the support.


    I am fully aware that the configuration is not supported and that I am on my own here.


    Unfortunately I forgot to mention that of course the expansions were mechanically supported. Hanging such a valuable thing just in air already _looks_ like a bad idea :D .


    Let me go through your suggestions and get back here when/if I have an update.


    A screenshot would rather come after that - no need to potentially do something bad to the system if I know it wont work.

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