Emax

I took an Emax HD kybd with an internal drive (original Miniscribe) and wanted to add the Plus OS for an external drive in the near future (not yet purchased.)

Since it was not an SE, I applied the SE upgrade using a floppy I made w/ EMXP and followed the instructions in the SE Upgrade manual. It booted fine and reported that it applied the SE upgrade. I then rebooted but it wouldn't reboot the first time. I think it hung up on loading the software from the floppy but I'm not 100% sure. I just turned it off and booted again. This time it booted normally and I confirmed the HD SE OS was what had loaded.

Then I made a floppy with Plus 1.0 OS and booted to that. It booted fine and also reported the proper OS revision. Next I went to copy the software to my HD so it would always boot into Plus OS w/o need for a floppy. Copying of software seemed to work fine. Pressing transpose showed the SCSI id options and displayed id 0 in the window for my internal drive. Everything seemed good... until I rebooted.

The following issues now happen depending on what OS & which drive (FD or HD) I try to boot to:

- booting w/ No floppy in drive: HD spins up, but freezes at "Loading Software" and never recovered.

- booting w/ Plus OS floppy in drive: Floppy spins up and gets to "Loading Software" and then the screen displays "Just a moment..." and then freezes up.

- booting w/ SE HD 1.1 floppy WORKED, but could I not access the hard drive. I got "HD Error" when trying any HD functionality.

At this point I just started trying to reboot over and over and I did manage to boot to the Plus OS floppy ONCE. With the Plus OS in memory, any HD operations would give "HD Catalog Error" as if the drive wasn't there, yet the drive does spin.

Next step was swapping another HD from a different Emax. It booted to the 2nd HD just fine, and would also boot to any of my various OS floppies. The OS that was installed on the 2nd HD was just HD 1.1 (not the SE os).

So like an idiot (thinking the 1st HD just went bad), I proceeded to copy the Plus software to the 2nd HD. Software copy reported no errors; however, rebooting put me right back where I started with all the same errors as above. And now 2 hard drives are essentially toast.

I can't reformat them because no matter which floppy OS I boot with, any attempt to access a hard drive gives "HD Error" or "HD Catalog Error"(w/ Plus OS).

What did I do??

It all seemed "by the book."; I still have 2 more hard drives (1 Miniscribe and 1 Quantum) that are working in 2 other Emaxes, but I'm afraid of screwing them up.

Suggestions?

Regards,

Jim

Thanks Ted, but I already tried copying different software (though not a different copy of the plus os).

The problem is that I can't access the HD with ANY OS now. No matter which OS floppy I boot with, the 2 hard drives are totally inaccessible. Plus OS gives "HD Catalog Error" when attempting any HD functionality, and all the other operating systems give "HD Error" when trying to access the hd.

I even tried to fake it out by disconnecting the scsi cable to the internal HD, booting up into HD SE 1.1 OS via floppy and then copy the software from floppy to HD. Surprisingly this DID allow me to get to that menu option w/o the error, so just before hitting enter (or yes?) to initiate the copy, I reconnected the scsi cable, but I still get the error. I also tried this with Format HD since all my data is backed up anyway, and that looked like it was going to work too as it let me get all the way thru the menu options this time... again I reconnected the HD at the last second, hit enter and it displayed "Formatting HD..." but it froze there and never completed. Same w/ both drives.

So it seems that if the HD is connected at start up, even when booting to floppy, it still spins as it is checked or whatever, but there is no way it will access any HD menu options/functions from that point forward. However if I disconnect the HD & boot to floppy I CAN access certain HD menu options like Master > Copy Software or Format HD, and it only then gives the error after I reconnect the HD at the last second.

It's like there is some kind of issue recognizing the drive on start up if the Plus OS has been copied to it. I will verify with my other 2 drives that they still boot just fine in this Emax w/o the Plus OS.

thanks,

Jim

Thanks for the reply Ted. For the most part I think we are on the same page.

>>If you boot from a floppy, it reads the OS from the floppy

Correct. I'm in complete agreement with you there.

But as soon as I access any menu option that will ultimately access the hard drive (like master >> special), the OS goes "looking" for for the hard drive even before it uses it, and this is when it crashes. Non-HD menu functions appear to work as normal.

I also would agree with you that the OS on the HD is corrupt or otherwise not "playing nice" but I am still at a loss for how I can get around it. I don't have a PC w/ scsi or other means to do a low level format to the drives so I am scratching my head as to how I'd format them in my Emax, if my Emax crashes every time I try to access any hard drive-specific menu option.

Thanks again,

Jim

Thanks for such a good list of suggestions; I certainly appreciate your assistance. Some of what you listed I have already tried. I probably could have put the following into the first post, but it was getting pretty long & I still wanted someone to read it :)

>>If you use the OLD OS you had that worked prior, it still hangs???

Yes. Regardless of the OS I boot to on floppy, the Emax crashes whenever any hard disk functionality comes into play, including just choosing certain menu options.

>>a. the drive (you have 2 different drives which show the same behavior, correct?)

Correct. I would agree with you that it isn't likely both drives failed on the same day. Possible, but not very probable.

>>b. The cable - if you are using the same cable, could be a bad cable. Do you have another cable to try?

I tried 3 different cables and, FYI I'm only using 1 internal drive. 2 of the cables are single-device cables (2 connectors) like the factory cable. The other cable supports 2 devices (3 connectors), but the last connector on that cable has a hardware terminator I've added to it. FWIW, I seem to recall using the 2-device cable w/ the added terminator on it was behaving strangely. I can't recall details, but I want to say there were more freezes & crashes w/ this configuration.

>>c. Termination - verify the termination is correct.

>>- make sure the terminators (resistor networks) are properly seated on the drive controller boards.

Good point. The drives should have resistors in place. I will double-check & verify they are all seated properly.

>>- not double terminated on the chain, etc.

hmmm... not sure if my 2-device cable w/ 1 drive connected, its own terminating resistors, and a physical terminator on the last connector counts as double termination or not since there's no 2nd drive. Perhaps it does, and that might explain why that combo was flaky. Unless you suggest removing the terminating resistors on the drive and relying on the cable termination as a unique and/or worthwhile test, I will just abandon testing w/ that cable & configuration since there is only ever 1 drive & I think I have ruled out other cables as a cause.

>>d. Make sure no external cables / drives are hooked while you are doing this internal cable / drive testing to eliminate any SCSI chain reflection or termination issues.

No external drives are in use. That will be the ultimate goal, but so far I'm not there yet so this isn't a factor.

Looks like I have some valuable homework to do tonight. I will let you know how it goes & am in your debt.

Thank you,

Jim

Ok, SCSI controller card arrived on Sat and once I was up and running in an old Win XP machine, I was able to format, read and write to 3 out of 4 of my drives. Two of the original Miniscribe 20mb Emax drives and a Quantum formatted like a champ and had no issues w/ reads and writes in XP. Chkdsk reported no issues.

A 4th drive, a Quantum from my old Mac iicx, was recognized in "Device Manager" but "Disk Manager" did not recognize the drive and thus I couldn't assign it a drive letter and therefore can't speak to the health of that particular drive.

Unfortunately, NONE of my Emaxes can cope with ANY of these drives in them. They all hang up trying to load the OS from the floppy. The Emax always stops shortly after "loading software" at the prompt that says "Just a moment...". I think it's trying to negotiate w/ the HD at this point to see if the HD contains the OS, because you can hear the HD start to spin briefly while the floppy continues to spin. Without a hard drive, the Emaxes will boot up to the floppy as normal.

When formatting the drives in Windows, I tried both Fat16 and HFS, but results in Emax were the same. Does the Windows format cause the Emax to have boot problems? Do I need to do a low level format instead?

Or is this not shaping up to be a drive problem anymore?

Regards,

Jim

Let me clarify. The HD always spins up the instant the Emax is powered on as normal (in both my working units/scenarios as well as the cases we are troubleshooting in this thread), but when I am booting from a floppy, it makes more spinning & noise (perhaps seeking?) a few moments later when it is displaying the "Just a moment..." message. This is the point at which it hangs. Auto spin-up is enabled by default on the Quantums by leaving the jumper open, and was never changed on the Miniscribes.

Do I need to do a low level format to the scsi drives before if I expect to be able to even boot the Emax to a floppy when the newly-formatted drive is connected?

Just wondering if the MBR or Windows OS is tripping up the Emax and preventing it from successfully completing the OS load from the floppy.

Thanks,

Jim

>>My spares had come out of old Macs, and had no issue formatting

2 of my drives are old Mac drives and while they had originally been reformatted in the Emax without issue, neither one works now as per the earlier attempts to copy new OS software in Emax. I don't have a Mac w/ scsi any more to try to format back to Mac os and retry.

>>but you said one of the drives boots the Emax and the other two or three don't, is that correct?

Yes, 1 drive does still boot in all the other Emaxes, but after 3 other drives have gone belly up trying to copy the plus OS onto them, I am extremely reluctant to do anything with this last drive because I don't want to render my last HD unusable until I know what's causing this.

To sum up this growing thread, I have 4 working Emaxes: 2 HD SE keyboards, 1 HD keyboard & 1 HD rack and about 6 scsi hard drives, but only 3 of which I consider to be fully reliable.

I upgraded the HD keyboard to SE, then booted to a Plus OS floppy to copy the plus OS to the hard drive. After copying the plus OS, the Emax HD keyboard wouldn't boot to its hard drive any more, and any HD menu options would give an error.

I then assumed the HD was bad and proceeded to take working hard drives out of my other Emaxes and put them into the HD keyboard that I had just upgraded to SE to see if I could copy the Plus OS to them. BUT now they all suffer the same issue of not booting.

Next I thought it was perhaps that specific keyboard, so I tried those drives in the HD rack and also in one of the HD SE keyboards, but got the same non-booting behavior. So I am really at a loss to say whether it is multiple drives or multiple Emaxes.

So Windows recognizes 2 of the 3 drives that Emax won't, and I formatted & tested them in Windows. They seem fine in Windows. So, hoping the format might have made a difference I tried the drives back in the Emaxes, but they don't work--in any of the Emaxes.

I'm stumped, and worse, I'm afraid to spring for a CF drive until I have some sense of what's going on as I wouldn't know what to troubleshoot/blame if I get the same behavior w/ a new CF drive.

Thanks,

Jim

Not sure I can unless there's a trick I haven't figured out yet.

WARNING

---------------------------------------------------------------

EMXP only allows the installation of the Emax Plus OS

on an EMAX-I HD/CD Image. Please select the Plus OS.

Press any key to continue...

This was w/ version 2.11.3, as well as 3.00. Did earlier versions of EMXP allow other OS for HD images?

I considered making a backup image of my only remaining, fully working drive but I'm still a tad reluctant until I know if there's something I';m doing that's causing all these issues.

Thanks Jamie,

Yours is the one I originally downloaded:

emaxplus10.zip 99 KB jammie.emma Dec 18, 2011

I also downloaded it a second time last week when Ted thought it may have been corrupt as well, so I'm leaning toward this not being the culprit in this case. Still wondering if the format failed of other reasons though, AND if that is to blame for rendering every HD I've tried to format in the last 2 weeks useless.

I can't even wipe the drives then attempt to reformat in Emax nor can I take one w/ an image written from EMXP and get it to boot. They just aren't recognized by the emax and in almost every case, the mere presence of one of these hard drives prevent the Emax from booting to a floppy as well.

Yet in windows and EMXP the drives appear to function normally. Confusing.

- Jim

>>So what happens if you change that OS on the image to a non-Plus OS?

WARNING

-------------------------------------------------------------

EMXP only allows the installation of the Emax Plus OS

on an EMAX-I HD/CD Image. Please select the Plus OS.

Press any key to continue...

This happens w/ versions 2.11.3 and 3.00. Did older EMXP versions allow different OS for HD images?

I guess I could pull my last fully working drive and do a backup image in EMXP, but I'm still a tad reluctant to mess w/ my last drive until I know whether there's something I';m doing that's causing these issues.

>>I have never seen the SE update go weird, but maybe yours has and needs redone….

Was thinking along those lines last night. Bad or failed eprom update? FWIW 2 of my keyboards were SE from the factory and I can't boot the drives in those either, but it did all start the day I tried to update a non SE kybd to SE and then to Plus. Could a botched SE upgrade be to blame for failed HD formats, essentially rendering those drives unreadable/unusable by Emax?

- Jim

---In emax@yahoogroups.com, wrote :

So what happens if you change that OS on the image to a non-Plus OS?

I have never seen the SE update go weird, but maybe yours has and needs redone….

-T

On Jun 30, 2014, at 9:10 PM, xeelox@... [emax] wrote:

Ok, I figured out how to add an OS to an HD image in EMXP. So I made an image w/ the plus OS but it would not boot straight from the HD.

Every once in a while, booting from the floppy with the hard drive connected, it did get past the "Just a moment..." message and finally finish loading the OS from floppy, though it took a long time. Sadly I still get the "HD Catalog Error" whenever I attempt do do anything that requires the hard disk. But it is an interesting change in behavior. It's a small clue, though I don't know what to make of it yet.

Jim

The SE update performs an update to the parameter EEPROM. Now, if it had written some bits to an incorrect location (IE, the SE update image itself was mucked up), then I guess it might be possible.

Again- I've never seen this behavoir.

Noting that if your EEPROM has bad values in it now in incorrect places, and update the SE again, it isn't going to fix the botched bits that are in locations that are not where the SE was supposed to update (does that make sense???).

Not sure if there is a factory reset to clear the parameter EEPROM....

-T

On Tue, Jul 1, 2014 at 7:12 AM, xeelox@... [emax] <emax@yahoogroups.com> wrote:

>>So what happens if you change that OS on the image to a non-Plus OS?

WARNING

-------------------------------------------------------------

EMXP only allows the installation of the Emax Plus OS

on an EMAX-I HD/CD Image. Please select the Plus OS.

Press any key to continue...

This happens w/ versions 2.11.3 and 3.00. Did older EMXP versions allow different OS for HD images?

I guess I could pull my last fully working drive and do a backup image in EMXP, but I'm still a tad reluctant to mess w/ my last drive until I know whether there's something I'm doing that's causing these issues.

>>;I have never seen the SE update go weird, but maybe yours has and needs redone….

Was thinking along those lines last night. Bad or failed eprom update? FWIW 2 of my keyboards were SE from the factory and I can't boot the drives in those either, but it did all start the day I tried to update a non SE kybd to SE and then to Plus. Could a botched SE upgrade be to blame for failed HD formats, essentially rendering those drives unreadable/unusable by Emax?

- Jim

---In emax@yahoogroups.com, wrote :

So what happens if you change that OS on the image to a non-Plus OS?

I have never seen the SE update go weird, but maybe yours has and needs redone….

-T

On Jun 30, 2014, at 9:10 PM, xeelox@... [emax] wrote:

Ok, I figured out how to add an OS to an HD image in EMXP. So I made an image w/ the plus OS but it would not boot straight from the HD.

Every once in a while, booting from the floppy with the hard drive connected, it did get past the "Just a moment..." message and finally finish loading the OS from floppy, though it took a long time. Sadly I still get the "HD Catalog Error" whenever I attempt do do anything that requires the hard disk. But it is an interesting change in behavior. It's a small clue, though I don't know what to make of it yet.

Jim

are you creating a blank new image in emxp and adding the os image to the blank emax image and then are you using emxp to write that image to your hd

On 1 July 2014 17:00, Ted Summers djtbs1@... [emax] <emax@yahoogroups.com> wrote:

The SE update performs an update to the parameter EEPROM. Now, if it had written some bits to an incorrect location (IE, the SE update image itself was mucked up), then I guess it might be possible.

Again- I've never seen this behavoir.

Noting that if your EEPROM has bad values in it now in incorrect places, and update the SE again, it isn't going to fix the botched bits that are in locations that are not where the SE was supposed to update (does that make sense???).

Not sure if there is a factory reset to clear the parameter EEPROM....

-T

On Tue, Jul 1, 2014 at 7:12 AM, xeelox@... [emax] <emax@yahoogroups.com> wrote:

>>So what happens if you change that OS on the image to a non-Plus OS?

WARNING

-------------------------------------------------------------

EMXP only allows the installation of the Emax Plus OS

on an EMAX-I HD/CD Image. Please select the Plus OS.

Press any key to continue...

This happens w/ versions 2.11.3 and 3.00. Did older EMXP versions allow different OS for HD images?

I guess I could pull my last fully working drive and do a backup image in EMXP, but I'm still a tad reluctant to mess w/ my last drive until I know whether there's something I'm doing that's causing these issues.

>>I have never seen the SE update go weird, but maybe yours has and needs redone….

Was thinking along those lines last night. Bad or failed eprom update? FWIW 2 of my keyboards were SE from the factory and I can't boot the drives in those either, but it did all start the day I tried to update a non SE kybd to SE and then to Plus. Could a botched SE upgrade be to blame for failed HD formats, essentially rendering those drives unreadable/unusable by Emax?

- Jim

---In emax@yahoogroups.com, wrote :

So what happens if you change that OS on the image to a non-Plus OS?

I have never seen the SE update go weird, but maybe yours has and needs redone….

-T

On Jun 30, 2014, at 9:10 PM, xeelox@... [emax] wrote:

Ok, I figured out how to add an OS to an HD image in EMXP. So I made an image w/ the plus OS but it would not boot straight from the HD.

Every once in a while, booting from the floppy with the hard drive connected, it did get past the "Just a moment..." message and finally finish loading the OS from floppy, though it took a long time. Sadly I still get the "HD Catalog Error" whenever I attempt do do anything that requires the hard disk. But it is an interesting change in behavior. It's a small clue, though I don't know what to make of it yet.

Jim

>>Noting that if your EEPROM has bad values in it now in incorrect places, and update the SE again, it isn't going to fix the botched bits that are in locations that are not where the SE was supposed to update (does that make sense???).

Yes, it makes perfect sense.

>>Not sure if there is a factory reset to clear the parameter EEPROM....

Yeah, I doubt they ever planned for that.

However, since the 3 screwy drives also fail to boot and fail to get recognized in a regular HD Emax (i.e. not se upgraded) as well as in an Emax that was purchased as an SE new from the factory, that perhaps the eeprom isn't the issue? Or could the bad eeprom have contributed in some way to the botched formatting?

- Jim

Jammie,

This image didn't work either, but it is the plus OS which might explain it. Any chance you have images w/ SEHD 1.1 and HD 1.1 that I could try?

Thanks,

Jim

if thats the case then the upgrade did not work correctly and so the code segments needed for the scsi operation does not seem to be working correctly as those images work full stop i have produced 300+ cf cards for people with library on with the plus os image and it boots everytime

i would surgest to check if the upgrade disk worked

as there are diagnostic routines that was never available in the pre se software for checking the rom and other parts and leaves leds on if there is a problem like if testing and the analog board has been removed an led will come up with analog processing to let you know there is a problem and some times wont boot past the diagnostics

On 2 July 2014 15:44, xeelox@... [emax] <emax@yahoogroups.com> wrote:

Jammie,

This image didn't work either, but it is the plus OS which might explain it. Any chance you have images w/ SEHD 1.1 and HD 1.1 that I could try?

Thanks,

Jim

Update after running Emax diagnostics as well as disk utilities:

BOOTPROM DIAGNOSTICS - NO ERRORS

Analog Processing LED (= Unable to load software from disk) stays lit briefly while seeking the HD, but goes out when the unit loads the OS from floppy so I assume this is fine.

Master - Special Emax Diagnostics - NO ERRORS

1. Bank RAM Test

2. ERAM Test

3. RS-422 Test - didn9;t test

4. Wr/Ver Fl Test

5. Ver Fl Test

6. Panel Test

7. Filter Trims - didn't test

HD Diagnostics - #1. SCSI/Echip & #5 Show Results gave no errors. Merely selecting any remaining option (2,3,4,6,7) immediately gave Hard Disk Error.

1. SCSI/Echip

2. Read Only

3. Read/write

4. Burnin HD

5. Show Results

6. Show HD All

7. Media Defects

Using a variety of Linux and Windows boot disk utilities, I tried testing, wiping and reformatting the 4 hard drives that my Emaxes simultaneously gave up on when this first started a few weeks ago.

1 old quantum pulled from a 68k mac reported having 0 sectors (something I'd never seen before) and wouldn't let me reformat or do anything with it at all. I am pretty much done with it and will assume it is a bad drive.

However, the other three drives, 2 Miniscribes and a different Quantum drive, all reported No Errors, and all were able to be wiped and reformatted multiple times using disk utilities in Windows and Linux.

Still, NONE of the Emaxes were able to format these 3 drives.

Using EMXP, I wrote an HD image complete w/ OS and banks to the drives. NONE of the Emaxes were able to boot, read or perform any HD diagnostics on these 3 drives w/ an Emax image already on it.

My 1 remaining good Miniscribe still boots, reads & writes fine in all 4 Emaxes; however I refuse to try to format it, copy the Plus OS to it, or run diagnostics on this drive as I don't have another solution just yet should it go tits up as well.

So, it feels like I am back to square one. Some things point to the drives, yet 3 of them check out ok w/ disk utils, can be formatted, and can be read and written to in Windows w/o issue. And other things point to the Emaxes, but taking the one good drive and putting it into the other 3 Emaxes works fine.

The only other thing I am considering is getting a friend to reformat the 3 drives for me in a Mac w/ an Apple Partition Map since I know the Emaxes tend to "like" older Mac disks. In windows/dos I tried Fat12, 16, 32 and HFS to no avail.

- Jim

Being a total Linux novice, I am hitting several walls w/ live boot CD's either not properly booting or not loading SCSI drivers. Same for Free BSD. Doing my homework on those in hopes of ultimately performing a clone, as well as formatting a drive with Apple Partition Map. Once I get over the hump I'll let you know.

Also pulled the trigger on a 7720 and ide cf reader/writer which should arrive next week.

Thanks again for your gracious feedback.

-Jim