THAT'S not an error I've seen before...

[marchie]

*yawns and stretches* it has to be nearly 25 years since we created this place....

So this SE gives a good startup beep, and then goes to a blinking disk.

It if I hookup the external floppy drive... It gives this error.
Not behaviour I've seen before.

I guess I'll have to wait till next week when my new long shank torx drives get here to take a look.

 

[cheesestraws]

That... is novel. Not a stock error message, I think. Is there an upgrade in it?

 

[LaPorta]

I was about to say, possibly an accelerator throwing it’s own error code for on-board RAM?

 

[robin-fo]

I bet there is an accelerator card inside!

 

[marchie]

Apparently there's a thread from 12 years ago when I booted this and... Yes. There's something in it.
I guess I'll see when the screw driver shows up!

Hopefully it has a pass thru... I have an ethernet card I wanted to add.

 

[marchie]

Aaaah, it's an SE Faux 30!
Standard Mac SE board, with 4x256KB SIMMs on it.
And a "New life computer corp" PDS board in it.
PN: CD306D SE

The board has 4x4MB SIMMs on it.
An MC68030 chip and MC68882 math coprocessor.

 

[marchie]

Well...
Without the Faux30 board in, I got this.

I took the mother board out again, took some RAM out because one is probably bad (causing the jail bars)

And now I get sizzle when I boot. I almost certainly blew the rectifier at CR2 on the analogue board.

I get the sense I'm going to have a cascade of problems.

 

[KennyPowers]

I've seen the same error before from a MicroMac Multispeed accelerator in an SE, which makes sense since it's a licensed NewLife design (the ROM dump says "NewLife" all over it).



It's a test for the onboard SIMMs (which are all required to be present). In my case, I had two broken data lines caused leaky caps, but I suppose that error could also be caused by a SIMM being bad itself. When I buzzed out the data lines between the CPU and SIMM slots, it seemed like they were laid out linearly, so D0-D7 were SIMM 1, D8-D15 were SIMM 2, etc. So, I would assume your error is a problem talking to the "second" onboard SIMM if they're labeled in any way. So I would first try swapping two SIMMs around and see if the data lines in the error message change. If they don't, then buzz out D8-D15 between the CPU and SIMM slot and look for broken connections. Looks like that accelerator uses tants instead of SMD electrolytics, so I doubt you have any leaky cap damage.

 

[marchie]

I've seen the same error before from a MicroMac Multispeed accelerator in an SE, which makes sense since it's a licensed NewLife design (the ROM dump says "NewLife" all over it).

View attachment 79466

It's a test for the onboard SIMMs (which are all required to be present). In my case, I had two broken data lines caused leaky caps, but I suppose that error could also be caused by a SIMM being bad itself. When I buzzed out the data lines between the CPU and SIMM slots, it seemed like they were laid out linearly, so D0-D7 were SIMM 1, D8-D15 were SIMM 2, etc. So, I would assume your error is a problem talking to the "second" onboard SIMM if they're labeled in any way. So I would first try swapping two SIMMs around and see if the data lines in the error message change. If they don't, then buzz out D8-D15 between the CPU and SIMM slot and look for broken connections. Looks like that accelerator uses tants instead of SMD electrolytics, so I doubt you have any leaky cap damage.

I swapped out the on board SIMMs for 4x1MB ones, and now I get a boot with no jail bars!

I put the new life back in... And I'm getting the same error.
Error simm d15-d8

So, I'm thinking I'll take the accelerator board out. Get my BlueSCSI programmed up with a few disk images, and boot this "naked", to test for any other errors, then see if it's memory on the expansion board. I have a set of 4x4MB SIMMs that looks in good shape, so swapping one or two in is probably doable...

 

[KennyPowers]

I swapped out the on board SIMMs for 4x1MB ones, and now I get a boot with no jail bars!

I put the new life back in... And I'm getting the same error.
Error simm d15-d8

So, I'm thinking I'll take the accelerator board out. Get my BlueSCSI programmed up with a few disk images, and boot this "naked", to test for any other errors, then see if it's memory on the expansion board. I have a set of 4x4MB SIMMs that looks in good shape, so swapping one or two in is probably doable...

I guess I should have been more specific in that those error messages only refer to the SIMMs on the accelerator board

 

[marchie]

I pulled and reseated all the SIMMs on the accelerator board.

No more error!

But it seems all the microSD cards I had are dead, so I have to wait till Amazon delivers tomorrow to load some images on the BlueSCSI and get it booted proper.

But I also noticed, this has a lithium battery soldered to the board. I'll clip it and solder in a MacBatt when they get here.

 

[KennyPowers]

You'll probably need Compact Virtual to use the RAM on the accelerator.

 

[marchie]

You'll probably need Compact Virtual to use the RAM on the accelerator.

looks like I need this one:

https://www.savagetaylor.com/wp-content/uploads/hardware/accelerators/New_Life_Technologies/NewLife25_5.42_19930514.zip

from here: https://www.savagetaylor.com/2023/0...-corporation/#newlife_accelerator_se_16_se_20