Apple III & Profile

From: Doug Spence <ds_spenc_at_alcor.concordia.ca>
Date: Sat Aug 15 04:22:16 1998

On Wed, 12 Aug 1998, Julian Richardson wrote:

> >> The READY light doesn't go out, it just stops blinking. It stays *on*. I
> >> hope I didn't imply otherwise in my original post, else that could be a
> >> source for confusion.
> >> It makes sense to me that the READY light would stay on when the drive is
> >> ready.
>
> that sounds right to me, too :) But at least it's changing state - I
> guess I'd expect it to carry on blinking if there was a fault. (Out of
> interest, how long was it blinking for? Seem to remember it used to be
> somewhere around 30-40 seconds on my drives)

IIRC, it was more like 140 seconds. :/ That's for cold start, when it
goes into blinking mode after a command is issued to it, I think the
blinking time is shorter.

> >> I played with it again, and I CAN get it to run from slot 3. But I have
> >> to use the Profile controller board that was originally in slot 4, into
> >> slot 3. Only one of the controller cards gets a response from the drive,
> >> so I guess one is dead.
>
> Interesting. My problem was probably that more than one card couldn't be
> configured at once then (maybe I should get hold of a copy of prodos
> from somewhere and that'll sort things out? I can't imagine the firm
> that originally used this machine swapping drives around all the time!)

Nor can I. My machine came with the two Profile controllers installed.

> >> Unless the cabling is wrong. :) I'm using a straight-through 25-pin
> >> cable, and it's 6 feet long. Maybe the Profile doesn't like cables longer
> >> than a foot in length or something? Or maybe it's supposed to have
> >> different wiring?
>
> well, I remember the cable didn't have any twists in it - ie. it was
> either a full crossover or straight-through. One of my cables is
> original, and it's no more than a foot long. Chances are these things
> would suffer from interference - try a shorter cable and see if it
> helps.

I actually DO have a two-foot ribbon cable with the appropriate
connectors, surprisingly enough. Looks like time to experiment with that
one. :) Can't do it now, though, as it's set up in the hallway in front
of my parents' bedroom, and it's rather loud. (It's 5:22am in this time
zone as I type this.)

Doug Spence
ds_spenc_at_alcor.concordia.ca
http://alcor.concordia.ca/~ds_spenc/
Received on Sat Aug 15 1998 - 04:22:16 BST

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