Hi If your 9383 is running on a >= 15 year old GPS module, that could be a source of trouble. Most of the modules from that era handle the GPS rollover problem poorly.
Bob > On Feb 16, 2021, at 10:00 AM, John Miller via time-nuts > <time-nuts@lists.febo.com> wrote: > > Hello Everyone! > > TL;DR: If anyone with a Spectracom 9383 would be willing to help me recover > mine, I would be eternally grateful! > > Early last year I stumbled upon a local Spectracom NetClock 9383 for a very > reasonable price. It worked just fine out of the gate, but because I am > incapable of leaving well enough alone, I popped the hood, took an image of > the CF card, plugged in a monitor and keyboard and instantly started to take > a look at the BIOS and the OS. Curiosity satisfied, I put it back together > and resumed using it as intended, but I noticed it was a bit unstable. (For > what it's worth, it may have been unstable before I poked around inside of > it, but I never ran it for long enough before opening it to know...) When I > say that it was unstable, I don't mean the clock, but the PC hardware itself > - it was crashing and locking up. > > So if figured, if it's not entirely broken, fix it 'till it is! > > I tried two things first: I put the image from the original CF card onto a > similar linear CF card and I swapped out the RAM SODIMM for another, though > those changes didn't improve the situation. So, despite the fact that I know > the Spectracom engineers configured the SOM modules specifically to be > reliable in the configuration in which they were shipped, I decided to > re-flash the BIOS on mine to a newer version. This was, I believe, the > pivotal mistake. The Advantech SOM-4455 PC module was shipped in the 9383 > with BIOS v1.14, and Advantech had a v1.15 available on their website. I > downloaded this updated BIOS image, the flashing tool (or at least what I > thought was the right flashing tool...), and I made a FreeDOS-booting CF > card. The 9383 booted off of this right away, and I used the utility to make > a backup of the original BIOS and configuration, then wrote the new BIOS to > the chip - and then it crashed and stalled. > > I rebooted the machine, but sure enough the BIOS was corrupted and didn't > boot. I went out and bought a TL866II EEPROM programmer and PLCC adapter and > confirmed that, sure enough, the BIOS on the chip was trashed. To make > matters worse, the backup that the utility took of the chip was similarly > trash. I was able to use the EEPROM programmer to burn the v1.15 BIOS to the > chip and get it booting again, and while I can get into the BIOS and start to > boot the OS, it won't boot completely - it hangs when it loads one of the > custom Spectracom kernel modules. Additionally, any BIOS settings that may > have been there are now gone. > > While digging through configuration files and scripts on the disk image, I > was able to find names of a few engineers who had worked on the 9383, and > when I contacted them they were willing to talk about it. They confirmed that > the only ran the 9383 with the stock BIOS from Advantech, they didn't make > any custom modifications to it, but they probably did make some changes to > the default settings, though they weren't able to confirm for sure. > > I suspect that one or more things is happening here: > 1) BIOS v1.15 breaks something that their custom hardware kernel modules > relied on > 2) Losing a setting in the BIOS is preventing said module from loading > correctly (I have tried iterating through BIOS settings hundreds of times) > 3) The interface on either the planar or the SOM-4455 module is damaged (I > have inspected everything as closely as I can and it all looks fine...) > 4) The SOM-4455 has been damaged > 5) The planar has been damaged > 6) The universe has determined that it is not meant to be. > > I have tried contacting both Spectracom and Advantech, but Spectracom has no > interest in helping me fix something that A) is 15 years old, B)has been > tinkered with in massively unsupported ways, C) is not even in the hands of > the original buyer. Advantech hasn't responded to me at all, and I have been > able to find BIOS v1.14 on their website at all. Best I can determine the > file should be called "4455v114.bin" but I have not been able to turn it up > anywhere. Go figure they're not interested in supporting 15 year old hardware. > > I have looked into getting a SOM-compatible backplane to see if my module > works in other circumstances, but they tend to be very expensive when they do > show up. Similarly I've thought about simply getting another SOM-4455, but > all of those that I have found has been outside of my price range. > > At the very least what I hope that someone here with a 9383 can help me with > is restore the proper BIOS configuration settings. If anyone is willing to > crack theirs open, attach a VGA monitor and PS/2 keyboard, and simply take > pictures of each of the configuration screens I can try and match my v1.15 > BIOS to what it is *supposed* to be. Even better would be if someone could > pop out their BIOS chip and get an EEPROM dump of v1.14 + the configuration. > If you don't have an EEPROM reader, I'd be happy to loan you mine, or if you > want to send me the chip I can dump it and mail it back. I would also be > happy to mail my SOM-4455 to someone to see if it works in an otherwise-fine > 9383. > > I know that this isn't the best piece of equipment in the world (mine isn't > even an Ru or OCXO model), but it deserves to live and I have a strong > feeling that it's not dead! I just can't bare to see it get trashed. > > > Regards, > John > KK4YWH > > > PS - Failing all of that.. if anyone is looking for a spare 9383 for parts... > > _______________________________________________ > time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@lists.febo.com > To unsubscribe, go to > http://lists.febo.com/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts_lists.febo.com > and follow the instructions there. _______________________________________________ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@lists.febo.com To unsubscribe, go to http://lists.febo.com/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts_lists.febo.com and follow the instructions there.
