Outbound 125

[Paralel]

You may need to write to the EPROM directly

 

[trag]

I think what I used to do, before I had a floppy drive was use Appletalk. Either the Outbound or the other Macintosh needed to be running System 7. Let's assume the other Macintosh is running System 7. Then use the Appleshare (IIRC) DA in System 6 on the Outbound (booted from Silicon drive) to mount a shared volume from the host Macintosh (can you share a mounted Disk Image? I think you can..).

It's been so long since I've done this. Anyway, it was fairly easy, using LocalTalk and AppleTalk File Sharing to boot the Outbound from the Silicon Disk, and then install the Mac OS to the hard drive, and then run the Outbound Installer on the hard drive. Then one could boot from the hard drive, and the installer should write the EEPROMs for the drive which is installed.

 

[aplmak]

Trag... Yes I have done all of this.. I've Appletalked it and ran 7.0 installers and so on.. I just got the installer disks from "haplain" today!!! So I am hoping the installation method will fix my Appletalk issue with System 7.. The thing is that with the CF card it just does not see the card at all... I think they must have had a special hard drive formatting to them.. something specific only to Outbound.. So I think my last resort is going to be using clonezilla and cloning the drive exactly like the original... This will duplicate the drive on the CF card exactly like the original IDE drive.. The CF card reader board emulates an IDE drive so I do not think it is that... It's gotta be in the boot blocks or something... As I said I am taking a break with this... more fooling around with it and I am going to break the machine... I've been swapping back and forth all week.... I put her back together and am taking a long break.. She's running like a champ!!! I just fear in the future the IDE drive is going to kick the bucket and unless I have had constant power to it I will loose the Silicon Disk boot... Then it will be just a showpiece with no functions...

 

[aplmak]

AHH!!! I see... When running the installer it has an option to install "EPROM Boot Code".... Well I'm not gonna take this all apart again.... Maybe next week... So I will connect it to a different mac and run the installer and install on the CF card the EPROM boot!!! Think it will work???

 

[olePigeon]

Out of curiosity, are you using the Outbound Installer floppies?

 

[aplmak]

OK so I couldn't resist... I tried it... Nope...  how can I write that EPROM directly on the HD (CF Card)...

 

[aplmak]

Disregard writing it directly comment.. I was reading page one of this thread... OlePigeon I ran the Outbound 2.1 installer diskette on a different computer and was successful in installing the disk on the drive.. It has a system folder on it 6.0.7.. and I ran writing the EPROM again after the regular install... Still nothing!!! Sometimes it hangs... I plug the old IDE back in and whala the regular IDE works fine... I have no floppy drive for this unit or the SCSI interface module..

 

[techknight]

I think because CF cards technically arnt CHS compliant. Maybe thats the issue?

 

[Paralel]

I bet some CF to IDE adapters are more standards compliant than others. You may need to try a bunch before you find one that works.

I'm going to be attempting something similar with an old 386 laptop, converting it from a mechanical platform to a CF -> IDE adapter. I expect I will have to go through quite a few adapters to find one that will work since the hardware on this old system is very, very picky about the drives it likes.

 

[trag]

It's not a special book blocks thing, because I bought some old Conner or Maxtor 60 MB drives at a local store and installed them in the Outbound, with no special copying.  However, the guy I dealt with years ago who was trying to hack larger drives into the Laptop said that there were a limited number of hard drive parameter choices (remember those?  sectors, cylinders, etc.) in the installer.   This is probably why only 20 - 80 MB drives were supported.

I would guess the trick is getting the CF to act like a hard drive in the sense that it should have blocks and sectors and cylinders, logically.

The "writing EEPROM" message you get is the Installer software writing the actual EEPROM chips inside the Outbound.  The EEPROM code does not go on any hard drive.   The installer detects the configuration of the Outbound and then writes supporting code to the intenral EEPROM chips on the Logic board.  It's like a little bit of rewritable ROM.  The chips are Atmel 28C064 (IIRC) in a PLCC package.  So just 64 Kbits each, 16 KB total.

However, I'm concerned about this version 2.1 Outbound installer.  I'm pretty sure it never went past 1.3.  Are you sure you have the Outbound **Laptop** INstaller.   OUtbound later sold a line of **Notebooks** and those had a somewhat different architecture and software.

 

[Paralel]

That's why I said to pull the EEPROM, and program it directly. Give it the information it needs in order to see the CF since the installer can't do it.

 

[trag]

That's why I said to pull the EEPROM, and program it directly. Give it the information it needs in order to see the CF since the installer can't do it.

But we don't have any idea what Outbound stored in the EEPROMs or in what format. The best one could do would be to take a similarly configured Outbound and copy its EEPROMs to the ones that go in aplmak's Outbound. As he's the first person, as far as we know, to try to install a CF card, no one else has a similarly configured Outbound.

Ultimately, we need to decode what goes into those EEPROMs. But that's a long term thing, I think.

 

[techknight]

the Outbound ROM would have to be reverse engineered. 

 

[Paralel]

But we don't have any idea what Outbound stored in the EEPROMs or in what format. The best one could do would be to take a similarly configured Outbound and copy its EEPROMs to the ones that go in aplmak's Outbound. As he's the first person, as far as we know, to try to install a CF card, no one else has a similarly configured Outbound.

Ultimately, we need to decode what goes into those EEPROMs. But that's a long term thing, I think.

Ah, I getcha. I thought he format, information, etc... stored on the Outbound EEPROM's was already known.

 

[aplmak]

I've got another CF adapter in today... This one is pretty good.. It's not thick on the sides so it won't bend the last 4 pins where the power comes from.. I might give it a try.. not sure yet.. Anyway it plugs right in perfectly and L's over right where the hard drive was... I had to get a female 40 pin adapter

 

[aplmak]

Well I threw in the towl again... something is definately unique and funky with these IDE drives.. I just wish I knew what those last 4 pins were for.. I think they are power... but not sure.. I just don't know.. I have taken my outbound apart like 100 times.. I put her back together today and she's staying together for a while. I give up.. I even formatted the drive as 20MB.. this card I didn't see the activity light go at all though... I even put power on it and still no activity light

 

[NJRoadfan]

They do make CF adapters with the proper 44pin 2.5" IDE connector. This unit reminds me of the Vulcan IDE card for the Apple II series. Extremely picky about what drives it works with since it only has a few parameter tables in the ROM.

 

[olePigeon]

The HDD died on my Outbound, I ended up going on eBay and buying a replacement HDD of the exact same model.  I tried a slightly different model and it wouldn't recognize it.  It was weird.

 

[aplmak]

If I could do an exact clone of it on a CF card do you think that might work?? Actually do a duplicate clone so it is exactly the same?? Thoughts?

 

[olePigeon]

I don't think it was a software thing but a hardware thing.  Maybe the ROM looks for something specific on the HDD?  I just don't know enough, sorry.