Print

[Lisa2]

It does not show the ROM version in the corner of the screen like I think it is supposed to.

The display of ROM version was added around Rev. D.  It may be possible this is an early "twiggy" ROM that does not display the revision.  Does your IO ROM have a sticker on it? 

Rick

[AlexTheCat123]

The I/O ROM is from Sun Remarketing to allow the Lisa to work with the 800K drive that is installed. Why would the Lisa have the Sun I/O ROM combined with Lisa 1 CPU ROMs? This just seems a bit weird. I am guessing that I will have to replace the CPU ROMs in order to get it working properly, right? Also, can I run LOS with the Sun Remarketing I/O ROM or will I have to swap it out too?

[rayarachelian]

Off the top of my head, D should be compatible with both Lisa 1 and Lisa 2, so it should be fine. The 800K ROMs should work with Lisa Office System as well.

[AlexTheCat123]

I think that I have revision C, not revision D. From what I have read, revision C is only compatible with the Lisa 1. That would explain why it shows two drives under the Startup From menu instead of one.

[rayarachelian]

I think that I have revision C, not revision D. From what I have read, revision C is only compatible with the Lisa 1. That would explain why it shows two drives under the Startup From menu instead of one.

That's pretty rare if it is an original C ROM, well that is, rare in the sense of an original ROM from Apple back from 1982 and has the original sticker on it. All the ROMs are available on bitsavers and if you have a an EEPROM programmer, you can burn your own, if not I'd contact John at Vintage Micros for a set.

Fair enough, though, I'd still worry about fixing the rest of the hardware first before worrying too much about the ROM version. Any luck with the video board and other related stuff?

[AlexTheCat123]

The video board is working great and I just fixed the second memory board, so it seems to recognize the full 1MB now. Also, a transistor is on the way to get the sound working. It seems that I may have been wrong about the ROM version because the computer boots just fine from a MacWorks 1.0 boot disk, which makes me think that it has to be revision D or later, even though it has a C written on it. Although the MacWorks disk worked just fine, it gives an error 49 whenever I try to boot from a LisaTest 3.0 disk, so there may still be some problems with it. Unfortunately, the floppy drive in the Quadra 700 that I was using to make disks for the Lisa last night stopped working in the middle of making a disk, so I have not been able to test any other disks on it yet. I will set up another Mac this afternoon and make some more disks to see if it will boot from any of them.

[rayarachelian]

The video board is working great and I just fixed the second memory board, so it seems to recognize the full 1MB now. Also, a transistor is on the way to get the sound working.

That's awesome! Congrats! You've just about got yourself a working Lisa! Well done!

It seems that I may have been wrong about the ROM version because the computer boots just fine from a MacWorks 1.0 boot disk, which makes me think that it has to be revision D or later, even though it has a C written on it.

When you first power on the Lisa, during the self test, but before the boot menu that shows floppy, you'll see the version in the upper right corner, i.e. D/A8 for the "D" boot ROM version and A8 for the I/O ROM.

Although the MacWorks disk worked just fine, it gives an error 49 whenever I try to boot from a LisaTest 3.0 disk, so there may still be some problems with it.
 

Yeah, I'd just assume a bad floppy at this point, download another from elsewhere and - there are many versions of LisaTest, so not sure which one is valid for what system exactly, but sounds like that one is throwing an A or F-Line exception during boot, so it's likely corrupt.

Unfortunately, the floppy drive in the Quadra 700 that I was using to make disks for the Lisa last night stopped working in the middle of making a disk, so I have not been able to test any other disks on it yet. I will set up another Mac this afternoon and make some more disks to see if it will boot from any of them.

I'd say try to fix the serial ports next, so you can fire up BLU.

Another possibility is to get a FloppyEmu ( https://www.bigmessowires.com/floppy-emu/ ) and get the A/B switch board for it so you can switch between the physical floppy drive and the emu, these are awesome. You can use a tiny screen to select a disk image from an SDHC card, and not have to deal with actual floppies at all. I have one, as well as an X/Profile, both are highly recommended.
BTW, the X/Profile does work with certain CF to SD card adapters so don't worry about CF cards getting scarce.

[AlexTheCat123]

That's awesome! Congrats! You've just about got yourself a working Lisa! Well done!

Yep! It's just about fully working at this point. I just need to fix the serial ports and test the parallel port to make sure that it is working properly. I am thinking about building an IDEFile instead of buying the X/ProFile because it is a whole lot cheaper. I just got a transistor in the mail today to replace the one that popped on the I/O board, but there was still no sound when I turned it on and the transistor got very hot, so I killed the power. Maybe the op-amp is bad?

When you first power on the Lisa, during the self test, but before the boot menu that shows floppy, you'll see the version in the upper right corner, i.e. D/A8 for the "D" boot ROM version and A8 for the I/O ROM.

My Lisa doesn't show a ROM version in the corner for some reason.

Yeah, I'd just assume a bad floppy at this point, download another from elsewhere and - there are many versions of LisaTest, so not sure which one is valid for what system exactly, but sounds like that one is throwing an A or F-Line exception during boot, so it's likely corrupt.

You were definitely correct about this! I made another floppy disk for LisaTest and LOS and they both booted just fine. The machine even passed all of the tests in LisaTest!

I'd say try to fix the serial ports next, so you can fire up BLU.

Those serial ports are going to be tough to fix, but I'll give it a try. I tried fixing them earlier and I discovered that one of the chips on the I/O board that controls them had its pads completely corroded away! I managed to get the chip out, but it is going to be difficult to patch all of those connections in addition to the other connections that I need to fix for the serial ports.

[rayarachelian]

Yep! It's just about fully working at this point. I just need to fix the serial ports and test the parallel port to make sure that it is working properly. I am thinking about building an IDEFile instead of buying the X/ProFile because it is a whole lot cheaper.

There's also this: https://github.com/stepleton/cameo/tree/master/aphid - see which one suits your needs.

I just got a transistor in the mail today to replace the one that popped on the I/O board, but there was still no sound when I turned it on and the transistor got very hot, so I killed the power. Maybe the op-amp is bad?

Could be. Whatever feeds either the base or the collector into that transistor is likely pushing too much power, or maybe there's a short somewhere.

My Lisa doesn't show a ROM version in the corner for some reason.

That's odd, are the right and top edges of the display visible? Could they be outside the screen? If not it could be this version is very old and doesn't display the version, or the version is displayed while the CRT is still warming up and not yet visible. If it's the latter, pressing the reset switch after it shows the boot display will let you see it.

Another thing you could do is go into service mode and look around memory to see the version bytes. To get into Service Mode, boot off the floppy drive without a disk in, and when it throws an error press Apple-Shift-S.  The I/O ROM version is stored at 02A1. You can read the boot ROM version at the end of the ROM itself around the fe3ff0 area after the copyright string.

For the H ROM, there is source available which says this, but the address may vary for earlier ones.
It doesn't seem to write the boot ROM version to low memory. If it turns out you have a rare ROM, I'd dump it out and see if it matches the ones on bitsavers, if you don't find a match, it would be important to send it to bitsavers.

Code: [Select]

3FF4|                       ;************ COPYRIGHT NOTICE ***************************************
3FF4| 43 38 34 41 50 50 4C  HDGMSG  .ASCII  'C84APPLE'      ;                               CHG005
3FFB| 45
3FFC|                       ;*********************************************************************
3FFC|
3FFC| 02                    VRSN    .BYTE   $02             ;version 2                      CHG001
3FFD| 48                    REV     .ASCII  'H'             ; rev H                         CHG001
3FFE|                               .ENDC
3FFE|
3FFE|
3FFE| 0000                  LAST    .WORD   $0000           ;checksum word for ROM test
4000|                               .END


Those serial ports are going to be tough to fix, but I'll give it a try. I tried fixing them earlier and I discovered that one of the chips on the I/O board that controls them had its pads completely corroded away! I managed to get the chip out, but it is going to be difficult to patch all of those connections in addition to the other connections that I need to fix for the serial ports.

Yup, that's the Zilog 8530 SCC. It does have a lot of pins, so you'd have quite a lot of traces to follow and patch. 

[AlexTheCat123]

There's also this: https://github.com/stepleton/cameo/tree/master/aphid - see which one suits your needs.

Wow! I didn't even know about this! Thanks for the info!

That's odd, are the right and top edges of the display visible? Could they be outside the screen? If not it could be this version is very old and doesn't display the version, or the version is displayed while the CRT is still warming up and not yet visible. If it's the latter, pressing the reset switch after it shows the boot display will let you see it.

The entire screen is definitely visible and I have tried pressing the reset button so that I can see the entire boot sequence, but it never displays the version. I have ordered the revision H ROMs off of eBay just for the sake of having the latest ROM version.

If it turns out you have a rare ROM, I'd dump it out and see if it matches the ones on bitsavers, if you don't find a match, it would be important to send it to bitsavers.

This is a great idea, but unfortunately I don't have an EPROM reader.

Unfortunately, I am going out of town tomorrow and I won't get back until Thanksgiving day, so I won't be able to do any more work on the Lisa until then.

[Lisa2]

If you get your serial ports working you can use BLU to dump the roms.

http://sigmasevensystems.com/BLU.html

[rayarachelian]

Wow! I didn't even know about this! Thanks for the info!

You're welcome. Tom does log on here occasionally so you can ping him about it. He's awesome. He had one of the earliest websites about the Lisa on the internet. You can find it here off archive.org, though some images might be missing here and there. https://web.archive.org/web/20021225192819/http://tangerinecs.com/~amber/lisa/saq.html

The entire screen is definitely visible and I have tried pressing the reset button so that I can see the entire boot sequence, but it never displays the version. I have ordered the revision H ROMs off of eBay just for the sake of having the latest ROM version.

It may well be the "D" ROM, I do have one on a CPU board somewhere, but who knows maybe I forgot whether it shows the version or not.

This is a great idea, but unfortunately I don't have an EPROM reader.

You don't need one. You can dump it from MacWorks if you've got a language to write some code in like a C compiler, you can directly access 0x00fe000-0x00fe3fff. I did that early on using ZBasic 5, but that was over the serial port. Shouldn't be too hard to have it written to a file instead.
Might even possible to do that from MACSBUG, though not sure how you'd tell MACSBUG to write something to disk, or maybe TMON.

see:

• https://wiki.preterhuman.net/MacsBug_Howto
•   https://tidbits.com/1998/10/05/macsbug-for-the-merely-geeky-part-one/
•   https://macgui.com/news/article.php?t=485
•   https://macintoshgarden.org/apps/macbug
•   https://macintoshgarden.org/apps/tmon

Unfortunately, I am going out of town tomorrow and I won't get back until Thanksgiving day, so I won't be able to do any more work on the Lisa until then.

Happy Thanksgiving, and I'm glad you've got an almost fully working Lisa now.

[D.Finni]

You don't need one. You can dump it from MacWorks if you've got a language to write some code in like a C compiler, you can directly access 0x00fe000-0x00fe3fff. I did that early on using ZBasic 5, but that was over the serial port. Shouldn't be too hard to have it written to a file instead.
Might even possible to do that from MACSBUG, though not sure how you'd tell MACSBUG to write something to disk, or maybe TMON.

Newer versions of MacsBug, in the 6.x series, can dump to disk, but I don't think these newer versions will run under MacWorks.

[AlexTheCat123]

Sorry for the delay in posting. I finally got the chance to install the revision H ROMs that I ordered and now the sound has started working, but the Lisa plays a low-pitched beep (which I believe means CPU or memory error) when it turns on and displays random garbage on the screen. I tried reverting back to the original ROMs and the sound still works, but the same thing happens. I have tried moving the memory boards around and reseating all 4 boards several times, but nothing is fixing the problem. This happened last time I took the boards out as well and I was able to fix it by reseating things several dozen times, but it's not working this time. My guess is that the edge connectors on the boards are intermittent due to me having to repair them with copper tape that begins to deform after lots of insertions and removals. Do you guys have any ideas about a better way to repair these edge connectors on the cards that have been destroyed by the corrosion or would I be better off buying one of these https://www.ebay.com/itm/143185668902 with a pristine edge connector and swapping my CPU and ROMs over to it? I am pretty sure that the CPU board is the problem, not the RAM, because the connectors on the RAM boards were not impacted by the corrosion.

[rayarachelian]

Sorry for the delay in posting. I finally got the chance to install the revision H ROMs that I ordered and now the sound has started working, but the Lisa plays a low-pitched beep (which I believe means CPU or memory error) when it turns on and displays random garbage on the screen. I tried reverting back to the original ROMs and the sound still works, but the same thing happens. I have tried moving the memory boards around and reseating all 4 boards several times, but nothing is fixing the problem. This happened last time I took the boards out as well and I was able to fix it by reseating things several dozen times, but it's not working this time. My guess is that the edge connectors on the boards are intermittent due to me having to repair them with copper tape that begins to deform after lots of insertions and removals. Do you guys have any ideas about a better way to repair these edge connectors on the cards that have been destroyed by the corrosion or would I be better off buying one of these https://www.ebay.com/itm/143185668902 with a pristine edge connector and swapping my CPU and ROMs over to it? I am pretty sure that the CPU board is the problem, not the RAM, because the connectors on the RAM boards were not impacted by the corrosion.

IMHO, those connectors off ebay are cheap enough that it would be worth buying a few just to have as spares even if you manage to repair the ones there.
They're around $15 each, right, but a new fully populated board would be around $250-$500, so it's worth having them around.

I suppose this is going to suck, but since you have a scope, I'd inject a high freq signal (maybe 10-20MHz?) into one end of a scope using a signal generator in series with the scope, then the other two leads I'd put one on the top side of the connector and one on the same connector's pin at the bottom of the motherboard. If the waveform shows up messed up on that pin likely needs a little help.  i.e. something like:

Code: [Select]

   to-lisa-mobo-pin-bottom<---signal-generator-ground, signal-generator-out-->oscilloscope lead a, oscilloscope-lead-gnd----->to-lisa-mobo-pin-top.

Before doing that which will likely take about an hour or two, have you tried spraying contact cleaner on the whole connector and then using an antistatic electronics brush (they look like toothbrushes, but black) to clean the whole connector?  i.e. brushes like these https://www.amazon.com/Plastic-Portable-Brushes-Cleaning-Keyboard/dp/B074LZ649V/ or (careful with these, you don't want to breathe the dust in and may be overly aggressive to clean metal) https://www.amazon.com/SE-7616SB-Fiberglass-Scratch-Brush/dp/B003NHDITW/ and https://www.amazon.com/MG-Chemicals-Electrosolve-Residue-Electronics/dp/B005DNR0N4/

Would you be able to try removing the copper tape and flowing some solder on top of the contact instead? not much but enough to tin the pin a bit, and maybe hopefully to get rid of corrosion?

It could also be that it's not the connector but the trace underneath is getting eaten by the corrosion.

It could also be something else like one of the MMU registers or connectivity to it has gone bad, and it's not the connector, but since you say you saw the copper tape deforming, than that's likely the root cause.