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Antonia 4MB Operational Questions


Larry

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Do you have 64k dram mod, or using Antonia with the base 16k? I'm asking because my version E works fine without Extsel hooked up. But my Antonia is from the first batch sold, and it is still the original firmware. I didn't recall issues with E. Just curious.

-Larry

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Do you have 64k dram mod, or using Antonia with the base 16k? I'm asking because my version E works fine without Extsel hooked up. But my Antonia is from the first batch sold, and it is still the original firmware. I didn't recall issues with E. Just curious.

-Larry

 

I'm using it with 16K.

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Do you hold the OPTION key during power-on?

Look at the pictures. The first is taken from this place and the locations of the EXSEL signal are marked with three red circles. The second picture shows where to connect the EXSEL on the Antonia board.

Black wire on the second picture is useful with rev.E IDE+. It derives the RD5 signal to the free 39th PBI contact.

post-26134-0-63931200-1484058208_thumb.jpg

post-26134-0-52395400-1484058218_thumb.jpg

Edited by Simius
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  • 2 weeks later...

After numerous attempts to use ANT.XEX to change the OS setting on Antonia while the Black Box is attached to the PBI of my 600XL, the result is always "Device Not Found." This is true when using MyDos or SDX. I've also discovered that on (apparently) random occasions, the Antonia resets itself to the default configuration. Not often, but it does happen. Today, I added 2+2 and discovered that when the ANT.XEX program gives the "Device Not Found" error message that this somehow causes the device reset to OS #0 with 64K. (I can always tell because the MyDos ramdisk will not initialize.) BTW, my Antonia still has the original shipping firmware. Not asking for anything to be fixed, but just a note to any BB users with Antonia.

-Larry

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Well, I have just started again with Antonia (without BB yet), I have the updated firmware.

 

Now it boots flaky, so sometimes is boots, sometimes not.

I can access the linear ram, with 816-code, so that is nice.

 

With the updated firmware:

MyIDE-][ does not do a stable boot (20130303 firmware), but I think the atarimax-menu using NMI/OS-resources to much crashing the program.

I hear beeps, indication (false) IRQ's going on somewhere. I did not try a menu without the heavy duty NMI-calls.

Instead I downgraded MyIDE-][ to 20120907 and that seems to work fine still.

 

I have MyBIOS-FMP 4.9.B18 and Altirra BASIC 1.52 in slot #2 (Fast Math Pack)

MyBIOS has no diagnostic-boot-up check like Atari-OS does.

BTW, Antonia is shipped with rev-4 OS, the memory-test also does the extra 64k XE :-)

 

My config, 320k rambo, with linear-ram enabled.

Edited by mr-atari
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Well, the BlackBox pulls the Extsel signal to select its own RAM. Antonia always pulls the EXTSEL signal since it replaces the XL/XE onboard RAM completely.

I don't think they can work together at all.

 

I don't have EXTSEL connected. Antonia works just fine -- 100%. It's the config program that doesn't work properly. I do have 64K dram in the 600XL.

When I first got Antonia, I connected EXTSEL (trying to get the MIO to work). Then the BB would not boot at all (IIRC) which is what I believe you are saying.

 

@Mr-Atari-

Sounds like I should think carefully about updating the Antonia firmware. If it ain't broke...

 

-Larry

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The Antonia's configuration register is on page $D1 (it is $d1f-something, I do not remember ATM). So it is not just "the config program which does not work properly", there is probably a hardware conflict between Antonia configuration register and the BB, which, probably, occupies the entire page $D1 and does not expect to share it with anything else.

Edited by drac030
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The Antonia's configuration register is on page $D1 (it is $d1f-something, I do not remember ATM). So it is not just "the config program which does not work properly", there is probably a hardware conflict between Antonia configuration register and the BB, which, probably, occupies the entire page $D1 and does not expect to share it with anything else.

 

Yes, a hardware conflict, because because the config program works flawlessly when the BB is removed from the PBI. I don't switch all that often, but when I do I just unplug the PBI cable and run from SIO or the Atarimax FAT32 loader.

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Hello everyone.


I got a change to install my Antonia I received late last year.


I have a stock 800xl that I was successfully using for gaming for a long time.

It's never been modded, so it seemed like a great candidate for the Antonia upgrade.


I installed (having to remove chip U29 due to height problems and jumper that sockets pin 6<>7) and it boots up. But the system is not stable.


I have reseated and checked my connections, but I am having a lot of issues.


Sometimes when it turns on, it will not go to Basic, or not finish loading DOS. Sometimes the screen is garbage, etc.


When is does boot up, and I can attempt to run the ANT.EXE (v1.0 is what I found online), I have been able to change my settings.


But sometimes when I run ANT.EXE it returns "Device not present, bye!"


And every time I have ever attempted to get into the ROM Flasher section of ANT.EXE it will lockup, or dump garbage characters on the screen. So I can't even attempt to flash different ROMs.


I have tried removing the "ROM" jumper several times (do you just remove the jumper, turn on the system, that's it to reset) with no luck or change.


Is anyone else having these issues?

Any advice or help would be appreciated.


Thanks!

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Since everything on the 800XL is socketed, I have reseated all those chips.

 

I also removed the OS and Basic chips completely. Along with all 8 DRAMs and the two 74LS158N's.

 

Should the Antonia be able to make it through the built-in XL RAM test? Mine starts off off, then dies about halfway....

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I would like to do as much diagnostic checking before having to ship it back to you.

I will try swapping the 74LS08 as you suggested.

Have you ever had an Antonia that is corrupt? And what would be corrupt on it exactly?

 

Why can't I remove it's ROM jumper to clear the Antonia's corruption?

 

Is there any other tests you can think of that I should try?

 

 

Thank you for the assistance.

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I have no idea what can be broken. There is a small probability, that it is an assembly fault. You may take a strong light and a strong magnifying glass and carefully inspect all soldering points.

ROM jumper could be helpful only if the FLASH content is corrupt. You can remove it, but I don't think it help.

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The only issue I had was with the board not sitting flush in my 600xl which made the system unstable. It was just a case of trimming the pins back on the solder side of the board and I could get the board to sit flush.

 

I'm really happy with the board. I'm looking at getting another for my XE.

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Tonight I swapped the 74LS08 from my 'parts' 800xl and now the Antonia 800xl is working.

 

I'll give it a few days of use to know for sure - but right now it's stable and I can finally get into the flasher menu - never could do that before.

 

What is a really good program to run to really exercise the Antonia? Something I can just set to running overnight and it will give it a full workout?

 

 

Thanks again.

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  • 5 weeks later...

Since I updated the Antonia firmware in my 600XL to the current version (January 2017?), now my MIO as well as the Black Box work with it. No issues. Rev D and E of the IDE+2 work fine. C worked previously with EXTSEL connected, but I have not tested it since updating.

-Larry

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  • 3 years later...

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