Atari PC4 and XT-IDE troubleshooting.

[leech]

@Clint Thompson

Figured I'd start a new thread about troubleshooting your XT-IDE, since the other one became a nostalgia chat. 

I know I had some issues with getting mine to work initially as well, I just don't recall exactly what I needed to do.  We can look to see if it is based on needing a boot rom (which I believe mine did) does yours show anything on boot up?

 

[Clint Thompson]

9 hours ago, leech said:

@Clint Thompson

Figured I'd start a new thread about troubleshooting your XT-IDE, since the other one became a nostalgia chat. 

I know I had some issues with getting mine to work initially as well, I just don't recall exactly what I needed to do.  We can look to see if it is based on needing a boot rom (which I believe mine did) does yours show anything on boot up?

 

Nothing shown on boot-up. I've already ordered another (different) card so I'm hoping that works. I've spent far more time trying to get this one to work than I care to these days.

[leech]

27 minutes ago, Clint Thompson said:

Nothing shown on boot-up. I've already ordered another (different) card so I'm hoping that works. I've spent far more time trying to get this one to work than I care to these days.

I hear ya.  With nothing else in mine, I still needed it to be in the 8bit slot.  I want to say I configured the bios to disable the onboard MFM controller as well.  I'll poke around and see all the things and take pictures when I get a moment.

[leech]

Indeed, I have the onboard MFM disabled in the bios.

[Clint Thompson]

15 hours ago, leech said:

Indeed, I have the onboard MFM disabled in the bios.

Odd. Your BIOS looks a lot different than mine! Unless you're in something somewhere else somehow? When I hit DEL on startup it lets me press 1 for setup or 2 for diags and those are the only options I have. How are you accessing that HD menu?

[leech]

16 minutes ago, Clint Thompson said:

Odd. Your BIOS looks a lot different than mine! Unless you're in something somewhere else somehow? When I hit DEL on startup it lets me press 1 for setup or 2 for diags and those are the only options I have. How are you accessing that HD menu?

This is my boot up and what I get when I hit the XCMOS, the first pic above is CMOS

[Clint Thompson]

17 minutes ago, leech said:

This is my boot up and what I get when I hit the XCMOS, the first pic above is CMOS

Well, damn.... yours appears to be a later version as mine is not nearly as advanced.

 

 

 

 

 

 

What are your ROMS looking like?

 

PC4X-BIOS

C101789-003 EVEN

C101790-003 ODD

 

 

Also curious about your board/revision now as well. Is it the same? C103524-001 REV 1.0?

Edited July 18, 2022 by Clint Thompson

[leech]

 

PC4X REV 1.7 C301768-002 EVEV $D202

PC4X REV 1.7 C301769-002 ODD $B731

Amusingly the EVEN is misspelled. 

Hmm, wonder if I can dump these...

Edited July 18, 2022 by leech

[Clint Thompson]

Long story short (limited time right now) the new and different card design arrived and worked perfect the first time without any hassle at all. 
 

I was pulling my hair out, all for nothing and most likely a borked device from Bulgaria. 

[leech]

2 minutes ago, Clint Thompson said:

Long story short (limited time right now) the new and different card design arrived and worked perfect the first time without any hassle at all. 
 

I was pulling my hair out, all for nothing and most likely a borked device from Bulgaria. 

Damn!  Well at least it is working now!  My problem is in choosing which OS to put on mine... the disks that came with it are all DOS 3.30, but the manuals I have are for DOS 5.0...