EII + Mac SD communication problem

[xmota]

OK I´m going to modify the broken one

[Elmbeatz]

DON'T SWAP POWER SUPPLIES AROUND !!!
There are different models !

Just modify the machine wich is not working !

Ohh, okay. Didn't know that
Can I recognize if two PSUs are the same model, just from their looks? I also have two EIIs, that's why I'd like to know.

[xmota]

I don´t know. They seems to look same. But the first EII has the older board with memory piggy board on it and the second one is the newer revision.

Anyway the new Mac SE1/40 is on the way from Germany and probably on thursday evening I´ll see if the power supply was the cause of the problem. I called my service guy today and he told me that he was unable to meassure any voltage on several pins of the power connectors comming from power supply  to both left and right mother boards.

Unfortunately there is no scheme of the poweer supply in my service manual so we do not know exactly what to meassure.

[Elmbeatz]

I also have one EII with a piggyback board, and the other one with a rev 1, without piggyback...

AND I also have two macintosh SE, excellent for EII communication..

[dr.c]

There is a revision number on the sticker of the power supply wich is on the transformer.
As well, sometimes, the harness of wires going to the board is not the same, depending of wich model.
You've got a working machine, so don't mess around with it !

I completely forgot about this little piggyback board and I wonder from wich software it starts working !!!! I can't remember (its about 20 years ago now) but it seems that maybe the Eproms and/or the software had to be updated if we had to install the piggyback board for the communication !

If there is a piggyback board, just check if its well in place.

[xmota]

Hi,

unfortunately 50% chance that it does not work has occured. The connector and everything around was checked, cleaned, soldered again. No result. 

[dr.c]

I think I have installed about 25 of these boards and I had 1 or 2 not working, directly from factory.

Can you note the reference of the circuits of the piggyback board and put it here ?

[xmota]

Do you mean the memory board or the RS422 board?

[xmota]

New Mac SE just arrived. The working EII does not communicate. So there is no problem with the Mac I´ll try to replace all 3 chips as suggested. If it not works, I´ll be probably selling the EII and looking for one with the working RS422 communication.

[dr.c]

Make a damn picture of this fucking board !

Its not memory chip !

If you received a Mac SE NOT communicationg with a WORKING EII, it's the Mac, wich is faulty, don't you think ?

Didi you turn Appletalk on ?

[JMP]

...and with reference to an earlier message of mine:

Did you try switching the mode within Sound Designer to/from Panel mode?

The EII shows/makes no connection activity until you switch Sound Designer to panel mode, when you have, the EII will then read addiitonal data from the 5.25" OS disk you have inserted. I'm hoping you have done this easily overlooked issue before your more technical considerations....    

I trust you have also 'actually' tried to send a sound bank to the EII within panel mode? Sorry to ask such a simple thing, but I have used Mac SE's with no problems and with NO modifications made to the EII whatsoever - Your EII spec appears almost identical to mine. 

[xmota]

I think it is becoming confusing a little bit.

Summary:

EII Nr.1 (fully working machine)

- Logic Board Rev 1.0 (scanner 3.1, main EPROM 2.1. OS 3.1, 5,25 and 3,5 floppy drives),
- no piggy boards inside
- bought second hand, never worked with Apple
- I have 2 Macs (SE 4MbRAM, SE1/40 1 Mb RAM), neither of them communicate with this EII (tried both ports modem, printer)
- Apple has activated Apple Talk
- Both Macs tested in EII panel mode (the answer is still the same "I can not communicate with EII, check the cable and current preset has MIDI on")
- Cable is bought from a guy from Emulator forum at yahoo, cable tested, there is no problem
- MIDI is on
- all adjustments as described in the SD troubleshooting guide for boards rev 1.0 done (with no results)
- I tried to switch the EII "Under control of Macintosh" manually in the Catalogue menu, still no result


EII Nr. 2 (used to work with SD, now broken)

- Logic Board Rev 0.1 (scanner 3.1, main EPROM 2.1. OS 3.1, 2x 5,25 floppy drives),
- RS422 piggy board inside
- memory expansion piggy board inside
- used to work with SD with no problems with the same cable and same Apple SE 1/40 as above
- about 1 year ago some voices missed, later can not boot from the disk (no tac, tac, tac at the beginning)
- we checked the power supply and its connectors (as recommended), did not help

Pictures of both boards will be sent on Saturday

[xmota]

Further steps I am going to do:

EII Nr.1 - replace communication chips 1488 and 1489, IC108 and IC132 + 4070N, IC131. (I´ve just got the first two, the third one will come from the EII Nr.2)


EII Nr.2 - checking the connections between main CPU an PIO chips

[Elmbeatz]

Although I might get trouble with DR. C, I would just take the output board (missing voices), as well as the floppy drives from #1 and put them into #2.

By the way: A good idea may also be to reseat ALL ICs of the machine. I also had dead voices and other trouble - after I reseated all ICs, everything worked again.

[xmota]

I´ve already tried to change the drives no result.
I´ve also cleaned all ICs and connectors in EII Nr.2 also no result.
If there are just missing voices I can use Nr.2 as a SD-Mac working environment and use the floppies in Nr.1. So the task is to make Nr.2 boot.