Who was after a Strand 500 series...?

[Ynot]

This has been posted on the Set Exchange mailing list...

[gaspipe58]

Apparently it won't complete its boot up. If anyone has any ideas on how mendable it might be I'd be very grateful. I'd quite like to give it a good home but it's a long way for something that will never be more than a oversized paperweight.

[Kazeja]

Please can you supply more details or photos of power up symptoms.

 

K.

 

[gaspipe58]

I've contacted the person offering the board. This is his reply -

Quote

Not a lot to see There is lots of whirring and the three LCD displays glow but don’t display anything. So VGA signal to the monitors.

I guess that's no VGA to the monitors. I could also guess what might be wrong and be way off target. I'd much rather trust the massive knowledge base that is Blue-room. Again very grateful for any help or advice.

[ianknight]

7 hours ago, gaspipe58 said:

I've contacted the person offering the board. This is his reply -

I guess that's no VGA to the monitors. I could also guess what might be wrong and be way off target. I'd much rather trust the massive knowledge base that is Blue-room. Again very grateful for any help or advice.

That sounds like it could be the Intel mainboard failed or simply the PSU failed - the latter is a 'standard' type of PC PSU so easy to try a replacement, if it's the mainboard then it will be trickier to source a replacement as it's a Pentium 2 - I have no idea what would happen with a newer PC mainboard.

If it were 'just round;' the corner it might be worth it to see if it can be revived but it might prove to be a paperweight as you say - it's a shame but that's where we are 😞

[Kazeja]

If a PS2 keyboard is connected, try toggling the numlock button.  The numlock LED on the keyboard will toggle in sympathy.   This is an indication that at least the motherboard is working.

With the console off, check security of the passive riser card.  This is what plugs into the black connector (ISA) on the right of the motherboard.  Remove (clean?) and reinsert a few times.  It has been known to work loose or make a poor connection over time.

Let us know how you get on.

 

K.

[gaspipe58]

5 hours ago, Kazeja said:

If a PS2 keyboard is connected, try toggling the numlock button.  The numlock LED on the keyboard will toggle in sympathy.   This is an indication that at least the motherboard is working.

 

That's a useful thing to know regardless of troublesome 500i's. I do have a PS2 keyboard which may be faulty in itself. Just a shame the desk and keyboard aren't closer together. I will pass on the advice.

 

 

8 hours ago, ianknight said:

That sounds like it could be the Intel mainboard failed or simply the PSU failed - the latter is a 'standard' type of PC PSU so easy to try a replacement, if it's the mainboard then it will be trickier to source a replacement as it's a Pentium 2 - I have no idea what would happen with a newer PC mainboard.
 

Again interesting! Is it a standard format motherboard? I have a few spare that may or may not work, one might even be Pentium 2. Can't see why a newer board would be problematic but then this is a new area and ignorance is bliss. PSU is not a problem - have loads. Software etc is another matter...

This getting difficult - thanks to the blue-room I'm not just thinking 'new board to play with' but also 'How much can I learn from trying to raise it from the dead?'

 

 

[sunray]

I have a selection of disused keyboards, (some unused) if wanted, I think possibly USB, PS2 and PCAT plug types.

[ianknight]

14 hours ago, gaspipe58 said:

Can't see why a newer board would be problematic but then this is a new area and ignorance is bliss. PSU is not a problem - have loads. Software etc is another matter...

 

 

From memory - you will need a motherboard with a 16 bit ISA slot to take the riser card that connects the PC part of the desk to the desk processor - some mainboard manufacturers leave them out to make more compact motherboards with more logic/better graphics/sound & more RAM on them. You'll also need a floppy drive interface - the desk is running MSDOS 6.22 underneath it all and it only knows about floppy disks, hard disks via IDE & VGA Ports on D style connectors - the serial port & parallel ports aren't necessary but depending on the state of the trackball you may want to plug in a mouse (either serial or PS/2). 

The older more reliable the motherboard the better really - GeniusPro can't use a lot of extended memory - gets confused with ramdisks (got a couple of faded tee shirts around that) and don't expect faster performance by fitting a fast processor - it all gets dragged down by software timers & waiting for interrupts - you'd be just generating heat and noise from coolers.

[Kazeja]

Strand tended to use 2 types of motherboard, AL440 series and SE440 series.

Depending on which one you use, the BIOS settings will differ for 500 series applications.  Default BIOS settings are not an issue when trying to get the DOS aspect of the machine working.

 

K.

 

 

[gaspipe58]

Quick reply - more questions later...

Thank you so much for your replies. I have just tripped over my first computer which dates from mid 90's and I think is a Pentium something. It was replaced due to hard drive dying and replaced due to a good salesman and me not knowing any better. So we may have a doner board!

 

I feel this isn't just my project anymore but a real community effort - keep the wisdom flowing :-) Software is worrying me - Where do I get it?

[ianknight]

40 minutes ago, gaspipe58 said:

I feel this isn't just my project anymore but a real community effort - keep the wisdom flowing :-) Software is worrying me - Where do I get it?

To be honest - I wouldn't worry too much about software as long as the hard disk is intact - the three 'scrap/spares' 520's I bought a few years back all booted when powered. If the only issue is a failed motherboard or PSU I'd wager a sticky bun that the hard disk will be fine, the desk will boot and you're away.

Push comes to shove - I've got one hard disk not spoken for in one of the 520's I have - I wouldn't have a problem loaning you that to image your drive - there are likely still many software tools that will make short work of imaging an IDE Hard drive 🙂

[IRW]

Once upon a time, I got a 520 to recognise a USB thumb drive using DOS drivers. Couldn’t get it to work on a 300 due to lack of memory, but it was definitely possible on 500-series consoles!
 

I didn’t progress it too far, as it was our venue’s main desk at the time, and I wasn’t quite as cautious/reckless (delete as appropriate!) when it came to messing with things I had a small-but-dangerous level of knowledge about then as I am now! 🤓😂

Edited November 24, 2023 by IRW

[gaspipe58]

Update.

 

We picked up the board last Wednesday 13 hours of which about 12 was driving! Too big for the boot, but I knew that anyway. Got in to our room in the theatre at lunchtime today. Applied power and got fan noise and blank LCDs. This was expected. opened it up, cleaned out the dust and checked the CMOS battery. It was dead. Put it back in and powered up - IT WORKS!! Apparently we're in 1980 but it works so I don't care. The CMOS battery will be replaced tomorrow which should cure it's time traveling tendencies. The NiMH battery will be replaced in due course - it's beginning to grow fur although not nearly as dead as the CMOS. We've tested it with a LED parcan and it works so all is good.

 

Tremendous gratitude to all who posted to this thread giving me the confidence to take the risk in the belief it was repairable. I've learnt a lot from this but mostly the real value of the BlueRoom community.

[DrV]

That's great news! I know I'm always bangin' on about this but don't delay replacing that dreaded NiMh. The damage they cause is really serious on a PCB like this with quite fine tracks. And just because it's showing a reasonable voltage is not a cause for complacency!

Dave