looking for e-mu tech

[massimo]

Can anyone suggest a reliable e-mu tech in eu (I'm based in Italy)?
My E3 rack needs help...

best regards
Massimo

[dr.c]

What is wrong with it ?

[massimo]

What is wrong with it ?

after a check at my local tech, who said the power supply was nearly fine but he resoldered something and now should be entirely ok, it passed from freezing and doing the "led light show" (all leds on) with the infamous System error UND (see my previous thread) to endlessly attempting to boot from floppy, then SCSI 1,2,3,4,5,6 and so on...
the floppy drive must be dead I guess. Being unable to find a floppy drive replacement, I just bought the HxC  floppy emulator, this will be my last attempt, provided that I will be able to mount it and load the OS properly in the flash card...(I am a non-tech guy)

best regards
Massimo

[dr.c]

You are doing exactly what should NEVER be done : adding entropy to a system.

FIRST, you have to get this machine running. You must test the +5V, all the voltages, and find out why it doesn't work.

After then you may mess around with the flash card... Where are you located, in Italy ?

[massimo]

Rome, Italy

as I mentioned, I guess my local tech did check the power supply, and mentioned the floppy drive must be dead. I must add I opened the box and checked the flat cable plugs, spraying deoxit on the contacts, with no results.
What I did not understand is its previous behaviour (see previous thread): I mean, it did boot the OS from the floppy, worked for a while (less and less time), then froze with the System Error UND message, producing a siren sound...
I guess the machine only boots from the floppy drive once, at the beginning, so once it booted right, if it freezes it must be something else than the drive, no?
In any case, it doesn't boot at all now, so maybe the PSU is now fine, but the floppy drive is eventually dead. Thence the drive emulator idea...

thanks for your help!
best regards
Massimo

[dr.c]

There is a board, called : microcontroler board, wich is the one with all the memory simms.
Take the memory simms away, change their order (for example, if you have eight simms, put at the first place the eight one, etc... so if a simm is dead, it is replaced by one that works, this is important for the first one wich is used also as scratchpad memory. If this simm is dead, nothing works. If you replace it, tha machine will work, but you will have a bad memory somewhere. Dio you get it ?
Veryfy every connecteor.
Let me know

[moogah]

I've just bought an EIII keyboard and it has exactly the same problem you describe.  It has some difficulty in booting from the internal HD (sometimes displaying solid bars on the LCD when powered on, sometimes the panel lights up but is unresponsive).  When it does boot it will work for a period of time and then the System Error UND message along with a drifting tone (siren) in the output.

Can you confirm that your EIII has stopped showing the System Error UND message after your tech worked on the power supply?  If so I would suspect that the message is telling me that it's detected an under-voltage somewhere (something I can actually fix!)

[dr.c]

Try to reinstall the software. Chances of success : 70%

[massimo]

no more UND and evil "light-show", as I mentioned, but it does not even boot the OS, so it is a different condition than when I first mentioned the problem here. The present situation shown on the display is, it spins cyclically through all SCSI ports forever, and does not see the floppy it should boot the OS from...
BTW, I haven't yet tried what drC suggested with simms boards, I feel rather unsafe as of how to actually perform the task, but I will. What I tried one month ago was trying the floppy drive of my Oberheim DPX-1 in the E3, with no success...

best regards
Massimo

[moogah]

Oof, we must have similar karma since my machine is also behaving in a similar way    I think there are some SCSI ghosties which may be affecting your system massimo, I'm going to start another post about this since the information may be useful to a general audience.

Thank you for the recommendation Dr. C and I think I understand why: if part of the OS became corrupted on the disk (or was corrupted while being loaded into program RAM) the undefined opcode message makes perfect sense (I've written a fair amount of assembly language and am familiar with various MCU's).

However, in my case the system error message will appear without having to touch the machine.  What I do now is power up, load the OS from floppy or HD and then load a bank which includes a patch with a latched arpeggiator.  I'll play a nice chord and usually set the lfo to adjust the filter slowly and then go about my business until I hear it stop playing, which usually takes about 90 minutes if the EIII hasn't been on for a while.  Unfortunately I have confirmed that the PSU voltages are all fine when the EIII locks up, but that probably doesn't surprise you 

Once it's locked up I can refresh the system with a power cycle, but it will only run for about 20 minutes at the most before locking up again.

Right now I'm formulating a strategy to troubleshoot the problem.  I think I want to start with observing the main CPU, Timer chip and Program RAM with a logic analyzer with the hopes of seeing the problem as it happens... but I must confess that I don't quite know what I'll be looking for yet!  If I'm 'lucky' the problem can be attributed to the program RAM (4464 DRAM) starting to fail since these chips are available and cheap...  I really hope I don't end up seeing signs that one of the PAL chips or boot PROMS have a problem since those parts appear to be unobtainable

[massimo]

bad news

I have performed the attempt suggested by DrC
I have changed position of all SIMMS cards, and sprayed deoxit on contacts
re-seated the microcontroller board and turned the power on...

nothing- the situation is exactly the same as before. The display message cycles from "Booting from floppy" to "Checking SCSI drives" 1 to 7. The display line above this says "Software: v. 2.42", as it should.
Since the box is open, I can see that the light of the floppy drive is lit when it says booting from floppy, and then turns off when cycling the SCSI drives. Only, the floppy drive does the wrong noise- it doesn't do that loud "clack-clack" it usually does when working right.

Now, my humble non-tech (I am only a classical guitarist and longtime synth enthusiast) thoughts:
1. Maybe in a way this is a good thing- this should not be a memory card (hard to find) problem
2. Maybe the initial System Error UND message on the display was caused by the power supply, and that has actually been fixed by my tech. That message, and "evil" light show on the display and leds do not appear anymore, as I mentioned in earlier posts;
3. Maybe I am left with a faulty floppy drive, as suggested by the same tech.
4. where can I find a replacement drive? I have been unable to find the TEAC drive suggested in the Emulator Archives website. I am told the drives in the Emax and even (I believe I read) the old Atari Mega drive should work. Can anybody suggest where to find one?
5. Should I decide to try the HxC floppy emulator which is presently installed in my DPX-1 (big fun!) with the E3, how do I load the 2.42 OS into the SD card? I mean, should it be converted into the HxC proprietary extension, as was necessary with the soundbank for the DPX?

(By the way, it's 2.40 a.m.)

Any suggestions anyone?
Thanks
best regards
Massimo

[massimo]

Yes!!!
It works fine!!!

The Story:
Yesterday I drove 300km north to pick up an E4 Platinum. Since the seller was the same nice guy who had sold me his E3 rack three years ago, I had previously mentioned to him over the phone my troubles with that machine. Being also a computer repair tech, he kindly said "bring the E3 with you, I'll take a look, we'll try to swap spare floppy drives".
First attempt: we unmount the floppy drive, and connect it to an old Emax2 of his. Big big surprise: it works. Remount it on my E3: doesn't work- it spins, then stops, then spins again, but doesn't boot the disk.
Second attempt: let's try another floppy disk with a copy of the OS. I was skeptical: that guy had sold me the thing with two spare disks carrying the OS. I had obviously tried both those spares at home, and the problem had remained, so I had to conclude it was the drive. The experiment gives the same sad results yesterday: problem not solved.
Third attempt: he says- let's try and get the machine running making it boot an older OS (there were two more spare floppies with copies of the old OS). Surprise: the thing works!! So, the floppy drive itself works fine on my E3. The drive is not the problem.
Fourth attempt: my E3 came with a Syquest hard drive he had mounted in place of the frontal drive, for bank storage. The guy says the Syquest cartridge must contain a copy of the latest OS (we had run empty of those) in addition to the banks, because the E3 only makes the first boot (at machine power up) from the floppy drive, then routinely "feeds" itself with the necessary OS information during use from the hard drive. We put a blank floppy into its drive, then let the E3 transfer that precious 2.42 OS from the Syquest to that floppy. Now we have a new copy of the OS in a new (well, more or less...) floppy disk.
Fifth attempt: the floppy with the OS is in its drive. We turn the machine off then on
and...it boots the system flawlessly!!! no more endless spinning through non-existant SCSIs etc. (see above). The machine morks perfectly.
Morale: Yes, I feel silly to admit, it was only a diskette problem. The big problem was that also the spare diskettes I had, were faulty. While it is conceiveable that the diskette taking daily use deteriorates with time, it is less obvious that two spares that stay stored and unused die (both!) during the same time span. This was what misled me, making me think it couldn't be the diskettes, must be the drive.
Morale (continued): the initial SystemError UND, sound freezing and led "light show" must have been due to drifted power supply. When my tech in Rome checked that, that problem was sorted out. The endlessly cycling "booting from floppy, SCSI 1,2,3 etc." was simply due to a bad diskette.
Yesterday I made more spare copy diskettes with the OS. I also in addition bought from the guy a new old stock spare SyQuest drive he had. The box had a new sealed cartridge inside. We formatted it with the E3 (takes about one hour!), and uploaded the OS in it as well.
When, back at home, last night I re-heard what the E3 sounds like, I almost had tears- It is unbelievable: it is not about "fidelity" (I have now the E4 for longer, more hi-fi samples). It is about texture, guts, abrasive character. It is the perfect companion to my trusty Obie Xpander: the two, layered, are really out of this world.

Thanks to all that helped with this problem! It's been an instructive journey.
best regards
Massimo