Falcon Repair in the US

[Steve]

Is it possible to reach out to another Falcon owner in the US, like @coonsgm, and perhaps he might be generous enough to lend you a 'known working' CF card (BOOTABLE with software/drivers pre-installed) So you can just put it straight into the machine, just to rule out any issues with the ones you have? I also wonder if there is a possibility that the CF reader could be faulty too. It's important to rule these things out first, using Occam's Razor technique, usually the simplest answer is the correct answer, which often turns out to be the case in retro computers. You might think I'm exaggerating, but honestly this is almost always the case (which is a good thing) You should certainly prefer an easy fix if possible.

[rubber_jonnie]

This is one of the pictures that didn't come through. It shows the monitor with the adapter connect. I would have expected to see at least a C drive. All that's on the desktop is floppy A and B.

IMG_0221.jpeg

Yes, but do you see the activity light flash during boot? According to the Best site it's got drivers installed so you should see them loading when you boot.

If you don't see anything loading, then you won't get a C: drive.

Also, and I can't recall 100% if it's the case as I've not set one up in a while, but you may need to add the C: drive icon to the desktop using the "Install Disk Drive' option in the 'Options' menu.

[Glorfindeal]

Been there, done that. No activity light during startup and adding a C device just puts an icon on the desktop. Clicking on it does nothing but bring up a error dialog..

To Steve, the card I got from Best is a known good card. They test everything before shipping it out. Also, I connected a known good ide drive with the same results so I really don’t need another card to verify the ide bus is toast.

[Steve]

Okay well good luck & I hope you can find a local repairer.

[rubber_jonnie]

Been there, done that. No activity light during startup and adding a C device just puts an icon on the desktop. Clicking on it does nothing but bring up a error dialog..

To Steve, the card I got from Best is a known good card. They test everything before shipping it out. Also, I connected a known good ide drive with the same results so I really don’t need another card to verify the ide bus is toast.

Well, the IDE connector is very simple, with address and data connections, plus 6 connections elsewhere as I've written below:

IMG20240620114803.jpg

IDEIRQ appears to be an output from the drive and and goes via U25 and U26, ending up U31.

There are several candidates IC wise:

The YM-3439, U17
The Combel, U56
U25 & U26
U31, the 68901

I hope you can find a repairer who can trace it through, but I'd be very careful who you ask to do it, I've seen a few horror stories about the fragility of Falcon boards.

[smoore100]

Can't remember if the diagnostic cartridge can check the IDE but might be an idea?

[stween]

Is it possible to reach out to another Falcon owner in the US, like @coonsgm, and perhaps he might be generous enough to lend you a 'known working' CF card (BOOTABLE with software/drivers pre-installed) So you can just put it straight into the machine, just to rule out any issues with the ones you have? I also wonder if there is a possibility that the CF reader could be faulty too. It's important to rule these things out first, using Occam's Razor technique, usually the simplest answer is the correct answer, which often turns out to be the case in retro computers. You might think I'm exaggerating, but honestly this is almost always the case (which is a good thing) You should certainly prefer an easy fix if possible.

I haven't been following this thread, but if you don't mind me occasionally taking an age to find focus for a project, I do also have a Falcon here in Brooklyn if you need a sanity check on something. Fairly sure I only have an IDE -> SD card reader in it though, not a CF card reader. I can double check and see what I have lying around.

[Glorfindeal]

Can't remember if the diagnostic cartridge can check the IDE but might be an idea?

exxos’ diagnostic cartridge does. It just times out when I run the test.

[Glorfindeal]

The board was recapped before I purchased it. Are there any capacitors that could be suspect?

[coonsgm]

Is it possible to reach out to another Falcon owner in the US, like @coonsgm, and perhaps he might be generous enough to lend you a 'known working' CF card (BOOTABLE with software/drivers pre-installed) So you can just put it straight into the machine, just to rule out any issues with the ones you have? I also wonder if there is a possibility that the CF reader could be faulty too. It's important to rule these things out first, using Occam's Razor technique, usually the simplest answer is the correct answer, which often turns out to be the case in retro computers. You might think I'm exaggerating, but honestly this is almost always the case (which is a good thing) You should certainly prefer an easy fix if possible.

I'm happy to offer my help however I can. I feel ok tinkering with my own falcon and doing known minor fixes on someone else's (like Clock patch installation or swapping the NVRAM chip / battery), but I wouldn't want to try fixing an unknown problem.

It sounds like you've tried all the kinds of things I can think of.

If there is something you'd like me to try out / test out with my falcon or send your way, just let me know.