I did not check for that.
Here is a pic
https://vintagecomputer.net/RDI/PowerLite/RDI_PowerLite_PLX800-1200-32.jpg
On Sat, Oct 28, 2023, 1:22 PM erik--- via cctalk
wrote:
> Thanks Bill, that is cool! So failing display means it is black, but you
> hear it booting from the HDD? Do you know what
Thanks Bill, that is cool! So failing display means it is black, but you hear
it booting from the HDD? Do you know what type of NVRAM was used in the
PowerLite? (Would be interesting if their NVRAM also has a "stop oscillator"
bit which I attribute to the problems)
Fired up my three PowerLites...all three need nvram batteries, no
surprise. One has a failing display, one has a dead display or an issue
with power but they all at least boot up.
Bill
On Sun, Oct 22, 2023, 3:36 PM erik--- via cctalk
wrote:
> Thanks Jonathan for the offer. Meanwhile X-rayed
Thanks Jonathan for the offer. Meanwhile X-rayed the 1643 as well and connected
a really big battery. Here again: Had to start the oscillator before the
UltraBook passed the POST and turned on the display - it is up and running
again now - UltraBook and UltraBook IIi restored. So my final
> Next step will be trying the same on my UltraBook (DS1643 instead of DS1553
> on the UltraBook IIi). But need to Xray that one first before attaching a new
> battery.
I have a DS1643 replacement prototype if you're interested.
Thanks,
Jonathan
After some silence I can report SUCCESS on that issue! YEAH! Happy I am:
After first repairing the TopMax programmer, digging out my old GALEP3
prgrammer and building a very special adapter socket for the DS1553, I was able
to have a detailed analysis:
(1) The DS1643 and DS1553 chips can stop
Before heading to some short vacation first of all: Thanks to all contributers!
I built an adapter for reading the NVRAMs in my programmers (CE2 pulled to VCC
using a resistor, pin 1 isolated) - this adapter us usable for both the DS1643
and the DS1553. The TopMax2 software has got a bug - it
In addition to my last message, I forgot to add the second page of NVRAM
settings.
Attached.
Santo
On Thu, Sep 28, 2023 at 2:56 PM Santo Nucifora
wrote:
> Erik, do you have any of the documentation for the Ultrabook?
>
> Attached are the NVRAM settings for the Ultrabook found in the
>
Erik, do you have any of the documentation for the Ultrabook?
Attached are the NVRAM settings for the Ultrabook found in the
"Ultrabook Hardware Reference Guide". Also attached is an NVRAM recovery
procedure that Sun put out on the Ultrabook.
Santo
On Thu, Sep 28, 2023 at 2:46 PM erik--- via
Yeah - reading the source code of QEMU I found the structure of the NVRAM -
EVEN BETTER there was a WEB page with a good description of the various NVRAMs
on Sun machines up to Ultra1. Yes, there "was".
FORTUNATELY via archive.org, that page can be accessed - Tad- here it
is:
Awesome! Didn't realize MAME ws limited to 32-Bit SPARC.
But the emulators can definitely be handy, or at least get you partly
there!
- Ethan
Hi Ethan, thanks for suggesting MAME - did some research and somehow I
do not think it emulates UltraSparc but only 32bit Sarc. But
Hi Ethan, thanks for suggesting MAME - did some research and somehow I do not
think it emulates UltraSparc but only 32bit Sarc. But saw, that QEMU has a
UltraSparc emulation and they...
https://www.qemu.org/docs/master/system/target-sparc64.html
...explicitly claim that a NVRAM is emulated,
Hi Santo, as promised I took pictures of the caddy of UltraBook and UltraBook
II (it is the same). The harddrives are slim PATA notebook drives and I ran
(until failure) 10GB...160GB drives in the UltraBooks.
CAUTION: Fitting a PATA SSD did not work for me - somehow they are probably to
fast
Hi Jonathan, will try that soon and I have got GALEP3 and a TopMax, so reading
a 1643 with pins left out should be easy. Zeroing is a good idea for the
beginning - just needing some content there that brings me to the Firmware ;-)
Booted the SPARCbook 3, its battery is in fact dead, and aside from taking a
little longer to come up (totally expected) it's fine.
Thanks,
Jonathan
--- Original Message ---
On Thursday, September 28th, 2023 at 07:41, Jonathan Chapman via cctalk
wrote:
>
>
> Yet we have a few
My Ultrabook is a U20-14-1X-128C3.
Hope that helps,
Santo
On Thu, Sep 28, 2023 at 1:54 AM erik--- via cctalk
wrote:
> @Jonathan: Wow, amazing project in creating the replacement NVRAM. You
> really spent lot of time and efforts into that one. To attach the external
> battery I took a X-Ray to
Yet we have a few datapoints showing that a dead NVRAM/RTC still boot
UltraBooks just fine! As I said, I personally confirmed with my UltraBook IIe.
Pretty sure the NVRAM is dead in my SPARCbook too, I can confirm that today.
Thanks,
Jonathan
--- Original Message ---
On Thursday,
> Hmmm, not sure on that one actually. So it does not boot up at all?
Yes - exactly!
> In the desktop Sun workstations and e.g. the Tadpole SparcBook, a lost NVRAM
> at least
> shows the firmware prompt on the screen (no HOSTID and no ethernet MAC).
Yes, that is different in the UltraBooks.
@Jonathan: Wow, amazing project in creating the replacement NVRAM. You really
spent lot of time and efforts into that one. To attach the external battery I
took a X-Ray to know where to have access to the battery pins most easily - was
just 1 hour of work but far less cool of course! Thanks
Thanks Jonathan.
I'm not sure this is correct as I needed to select a DS1643 after I tied
pin 26 and pin 27 to pin 28 (and cut 26 and 27 in a chip socket/adapter)
but I did manage to dump it. It is very small though. All zeros until
data starts at 0x1800.
Would you have an idea if this is
> Hi Jonathan, thanks for your thoughs. I am still using the same NVRAM, just
> with external battery attached, so no Chineese counterfeit.
> My hypothesis is: With the battery losing voltage, some bits flip first. They
> cause the error message you see and values get set to proper values. But
> Interesting - did you youse some modern technology for
> doing that?
Modern "special sauce" replacements from Dallas/Maxim/Analog/etc., plus a fast,
low-power SRAM, all packaged on a circuit board with Batten & Allen DIP
leadframe pins, like this:
> Speaking of dumping...
>
> Is it possible to read a Dallas DS1643 in programmer? That's what's in my
> Ultrabook. I just tried with a Topmax II that supports it and I get all
> zeros. :(
You probably need to make a shim socket and pull pin 26 to VCC (pin 28), then
read it as a DS1225. I'd
Speaking of dumping...
Is it possible to read a Dallas DS1643 in programmer? That's what's in my
Ultrabook. I just tried with a Topmax II that supports it and I get all
zeros. :(
Santo
On Wed, Sep 27, 2023 at 4:14 PM Ethan O'Toole via cctalk <
cctalk@classiccmp.org> wrote:
> > Interesting
Hi Ethan - yes, I think that may be a severe issue and getting hands on a
dump/making users aware was already in my first post and therefore it is also
titled "species needs rescue" ;-)
Never looked into MAME - if they run the OpenBoot firmware, that would indeed
be an opion! Thanks for the
Interesting - did you youse some modern technology for
doing that? I already thought to attach a logic analyzer to the
NVRAM to see which bytes are read first (e.g. for dtermining
the hardware configuration).
Late to the convo, but it's interesting.
You might be able to dump the ROMs and find
Hi Jonathan!
> Now the good news is, I can probably make replacements
> for the DS1553W. I already have a prototype replacement
> for the DS1643
Interesting - did you youse some modern technology for
doing that? I already thought to attach a logic analyzer to the
NVRAM to see which bytes are
Hi Jonathan, thanks for your thoughs. I am still using the same NVRAM, just
with external battery attached, so no Chineese counterfeit.
My hypothesis is: With the battery losing voltage, some bits flip first. They
cause the error message you see and values get set to proper values. But there
Hi Santo, thanks for your efforts in taking the vid that looks different from
my behaviour on all UltraBooks!
Drive Caddy: They are silly devices - no smart stuff. I can take pictures on
the weekend and make a wiring chart if you want.
I have a 160GB drive, WD1600BEVE for the OS. Erik.
/me hears mention of dead NVRAMs and materializes
Pulled out my UltraBook IIe today, it's fine with a dead NVRAM, just gives you
the usual "IDPROM contents are invalid" message you see on Suns.
If I'd have to guess, based on past experience, you likely have a counterfeit
DS1553W or you ordered
Hi Erik,
I just happen to have mine out and took a quick video of boot up. Mine
does not have a floppy drive or hard drive (I don't have a caddy) so it
boots pretty quickly to the "ok" prompt but you can see the LCD display and
when the LCD comes up.
Here's a quick video.
Did some experiments in removing/swapping NVRAMs and none of my UltraBooks is
reaching the OpenFirmware or even turning on the backlight/LCD, so I have no
way of trying to read the NVRAM contents from there :-(
Symptoms (i.e. behaviour of the LCD display) of the UltraBooks differ with
contents
/RDI UltraBooks - UNIX notebooks - species needs
rescue...
Played a little around - and the OpenFirmware's "dump" command on my older
SparcBook 3GX (so no Ultra, but 4m architecture) is able to dump virtual
memory. Obeying to the forth syntax, the following command...
1000 100 dump
..
Played a little around - and the OpenFirmware's "dump" command on my older
SparcBook 3GX (so no Ultra, but 4m architecture) is able to dump virtual
memory. Obeying to the forth syntax, the following command...
1000 100 dump
...dumps 256 bytes starting at address 1000. Of course, reading
pole/RDI UltraBooks - UNIX notebooks - species needs
rescue...
Just checked the datasheets: The NVRAMs of the UltraBooks I know of are the
DS1643 and the DS1553. Both should be similar enough to be read/write by any
reader that supports the DS1643 or the DS1553. Of course I'd offer creating an
Hmmm, did littel reading in the OpenFirmware manual I linked above. There is an
example how to use show-devs for listing the existing devices. The example
contains...
/virtual-memory@0,0
/memory@0,0
/counter-timer@1,f300
/eeprom@1,f200
/openprom
So being lucky, the hex
Yes, but usually that process does only reset the boot flags described in in
the maunal, it does not reset the hardware relevant stuff like the hostID and
MAC (those are lost in the Sparc Stations when the NVRAM is pulled or
completely empty). But of course one can not be entirely sure - I
> Interesting. So you still have got the hostid and the MAC address which might
> indicate, that the contents are not completely lost yet. Maybe just a few
> bits flipped leading to a wrong checksum (and the diag-switch? being set to
> true, leading to lng POST times)?
Maybe, but it also
Interesting. So you still have got the hostid and the MAC address which might
indicate, that the contents are not completely lost yet. Maybe just a few bits
flipped leading to a wrong checksum (and the diag-switch? being set to true,
leading to lng POST times)?
> Do anyone out there have got UltraBooks or UltraBooks IIi up and running?
> Would
> highly be interested in a dump of the NVRAM/Timekeeper!!!
>
> The failed first generation UltraBook are (DS1643 NVRAM):
> (*) U20-14-9-512P with three (!!) hard drives, no battery port
> (*) U20-14-3-128B two
Exactly that is what I did lot of times with my sparc stations already. But
last week, the UltraBook IIi showed for the first time inconsistent NVRAM and
following that, I replaced the NVRAM by one with an external battery but in my
sillyness I had not saved the contens as I was not aware of
There are solutions to the dying DS chips. I have seen replacement with
newer ones (but sometimes those have old cells too), surgery to replace the
internal cell https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZJDlNoJk7M, and replacement
with a clone https://www.tindie.com/search/?q=dallas.
However the critical
Hmmm, not sure on that one actually. So it does not boot up at all?
In the desktop Sun workstations and e.g. the Tadpole SparcBook, a lost NVRAM at
least shows the firmware prompt on the screen (no HOSTID and no ethernet MAC).
So there the situation is not as severe as with the UltraBooks where
Just checked the datasheets: The NVRAMs of the UltraBooks I know of are the
DS1643 and the DS1553. Both should be similar enough to be read/write by any
reader that supports the DS1643 or the DS1553. Of course I'd offer creating an
modified Arduino doing the task, to test it and to supply it to
I have RDI Powerlite 85's. The box says "RDI/Tadpole"
Bill
On Sun, Sep 24, 2023 at 12:21 PM erik--- via cctalk
wrote:
> The more are joining the higher the probability, that we will be able to
> solve it somehow ;-) What kind of UltraBook do you have got?
>
The more are joining the higher the probability, that we will be able to solve
it somehow ;-) What kind of UltraBook do you have got?
Quite sad and I really hate that type of "limited lifetime" :-( Unfortunately
the manufacturer RDI/Cupertino/US was acquired in 1998 by Tadpole and they
dissolved in "General Dynamics" in 2005. The remains are now taken care of by
Flextronics/Flex, but I do not have got much hope, they will
I have the same situation, would love to know how to resolve this as well.
Bill
On Sun, Sep 24, 2023 at 11:31 AM erik--- via cctalk
wrote:
> Hi there,
>
> in the last weeks my last two working UltraBooks died. Today I
> investigated the problem
> and obviously in these RDI made notebooks, the
I have seen similar behavior on all Force2CE VME boards with empty NVRAM.
On Sunday, September 24, 2023, erik--- via cctalk
wrote:
> Hi there,
>
> in the last weeks my last two working UltraBooks died. Today I
> investigated the problem
> and obviously in these RDI made notebooks, the NVRAMs
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