@NovaCoder

Yes, me being one of them... I am following all the SamFlex news closely and hoping the system continues to be developed apace with the necessary fixes. I will still wait for a while longer to see how things develop over the next 12 months. The next few SamFlex board iterations and updates of Os4.1 onwards should smooth things out nicely...

Q!

"i am home"

@Xenic

Same behavior here too. Can the Flex boot from a USB device such as a stick or an external HD?

Quote:

Xenic wrote: @Barret Actually, on my system I can connect the Optical drive to the SATA connector directly across the graphics card from the hard-disk SATA connection and get no graphics corruption with 1GB memory installed. It's connector J22 in the manual. If I plug the Optical SATA cable into either of the frontmost SATA connectors (J21 & J23) I get small black dots with 1GB memory. If you use the J22 connector you can access CDs but you can't boot from them. The only time we'll need to move the connector back to J23 is to install a new OS release on CD. That seems to be a rather rare occurance so I too may "wait and see" for a while. If enough new SAM Flex users have this problem something is bound to be determined about the cause.

Hi All...

I'm a old Amiga User and I've bought a Sam Flex 2 weeks ago.
I've experencied some graphics problem changing resolution from the 800x600 to 1280x1024 or 1024x768 both in true color.
I've noted that changing the screenmode while the system has booted resolves the black graphics corruption in the window that appears at first and yesterday I've found another solution (that works for me of course).
Changing the Wbpattern for the window to a filled color resolve this little problem. I haven't tested what happens with images as window background and I'll test it tonight.

My config is Sam Flex 800mhz with 1Gb of Ram

>@ChrisH

>I ask again, please explain how Linux would stop such a power problem. Unless >you are saying that ACube are lying about it working fine on Linux?

yes great, when acube say linux work, then it should work on all systems they sell and all components user use ?.have they all test, every board and components ?

currently it seem there can no user with that problem confirm, that linux work and OS4 not.

maybe you should read something about tolerance analyses.

Tolerance Analysis Of Electronic Circuits Using

http://www.flipkart.com/tolerance-analysis-electronic-circuits-using/0849322766-j8w3fvr3tf

Seem you dont know anything from developing Hardware.If something work on 1 system it its possible that it not work well with other components, but all electronic compenents vary from part to part.

if all work same, then you can not overclock your CPU.The CPU is specifie for a clockrate that it work in orst case scenario at the specified clockrate.and CPU that fail this, are sell cheaper at lower clockrate.

when AMCC see that all their CPU run good at 800 MHZ, wy they dont sell this CPU for 800 MHZ and more money ??

.But when you have no worst scenario, then you can have luck that your CPu run at higher clockrate.

the ram for example have 2 ns later ack signal, the power supply give 0,02 volt less than 5 Volt.The gfx card also sent 2 ns later the ack signal.

if all those tolerance come in bad way, then it fails, but when maybe the powersupply give a little more than 5 volts, or maybe the gfx card send the ack signal 2 ns earlier, then it work.or maybe there is no DVD connect to sata it work.but it can still happen that it maye fail.

But if it really work or not cant say, if it give in next 5 minutes no error, there can also come 1 crash per week from bad working Hardware.

Last edited by bernd_afa on 17-Jun-2009 at 11:29 AM.
Last edited by bernd_afa on 17-Jun-2009 at 11:26 AM.
Last edited by bernd_afa on 17-Jun-2009 at 11:24 AM.

@anyone

Ok, so I gave up trying to install Linux on my Flex and accidentally made it one step closer. I booted up the OS4.1 installation CD so I could remove parthenope and re-install SLB. Next time I started the machine I had a boot menu with OS4.1 as choice number 1 and Linux Default, Linux Title, and Linux Debug or something as 2, 3, and 4.

OS4.1 boots straight up but when I choose any of the Linux options I get a "Wrong Magic Number" error and it stops. I'll fool with it some more soon. At least I have the boot menu working now.

-Jeff

@Barret

Quote:

Barret wrote: @anyone Ok, so I gave up trying to install Linux on my Flex and accidentally made it one step closer. I booted up the OS4.1 installation CD so I could remove parthenope and re-install SLB. Next time I started the machine I had a boot menu with OS4.1 as choice number 1 and Linux Default, Linux Title, and Linux Debug or something as 2, 3, and 4. OS4.1 boots straight up but when I choose any of the Linux options I get a "Wrong Magic Number" error and it stops. I'll fool with it some more soon. At least I have the boot menu working now. -Jeff

How do you get rid of the parthenope boot loader and re-install the original one ?

Its ok, i've sussed it !

Last edited by Drex on 17-Jun-2009 at 08:17 PM.

@All

Ok I have confirmed that none of the Sam Flex graphics issues happen running Debian and KDE on the Flex 667 Mhz with the full 1 Gig of Ram Installed!

It took forever for me to set it up to dual boot (It's 4:00 in the morning). This post is from the KDE Konqueror browser and it's looking great. The machine feels really solid but perhaps not as fast as when running AmigaOS4.1

Must Sleep Now

-Jeff

@whiz
I think that there are 2 different types of graphics corruption:
1. Vertical bars an possible random corruption that orrurs in WorkBench windows can be cured by changing WBPattern prefs for windows.
2. Small black dots that can occur anywhere in the display but are most prominent around WorkBench icons, WB window icons & in AmiDock. This type of corruption can be cured on my system by removing one 512MB memory module or by disconnecting SATA connector from Optical drive.

I have grabs of some of the type 2 corruption but am unsure how I can upload an image to the forum. The image button just opens a window asking for a URL. Can anyone tell me how post an image to the forum? I've seen it done in other topics.

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X1000 with 2GB memory & OS4.1FE

@Xenic

Quote:

2. Small black dots that can occur anywhere in the display but are most prominent around WorkBench icons, WB window icons & in AmiDock. This type of corruption can be cured on my system by removing one 512MB memory module or by disconnecting SATA connector from Optical drive.

Also Can be cure by switching keyboard and mouse USB ports.Keyboard in bottom rear port and mouse in top rear port

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Sam460ex : Radeon Rx550 Single slot Video Card : SIL3112 SATA card

@All

When I first assembled my Sam440flex I also had random black dots around icons. Like some other people here, I made some minor adjustments to the hardware that shouldn't have any effect and the black dots were gone:
-I turned the case fan so it blows cold air in instead of warm air out of the case.
-I rotated the case 90° on my desk.
-I changed the HD led connector (I had it the wrong way around the first time).
-I connected an other monitor.

My theory is that the black dots are noise from some other component and by swapping or disconnecting some things it goes elsewhere so we don't notice it.

Kind regards,

Dennis

@all

Using Elwood's installation guide located here;

Elwood's Sam 440 Debian Installation Guide

I was able to get both Debian Linux/KDE and Amiga OS4.1 running on the Sam Flex with Dual Boot working. Here are some additional notes regarding the installation process. BTW I'll try swapping the USB cables and see if that helps.

The biggest problem that I had was getting Parthenope to recognize the Amiga partition with the Kickstart files on it. I ended up using SFS/00 and that finally worked. Something is causing a red "Guru" crash about half way through boot up on the Amiga side. The Sam Flex produces a nice display under KDE with the full amount of ram installed.

[Edit]

The "Guru" on the Amiga side was caused be the boot priority on the Linux partition and the Amiga Boot partition both being set to 0. I now have a small KICK: partition that is set as bootable with priority of -127 (Filesystem SFS/00), an AmigaOS4.1 (DH0:) partition set as bootable with a priority of 0 (Filesystem FFS with Long Name Support), and the LNX: (Linux) partition set as bootable with a priority of -17. Everything works perfectly now!

The Amiga side has graphic problems with both memory modules installed and the Debian/KDE side does not.

Thanks for all the help.

-Jeff

Last edited by Barret on 20-Jun-2009 at 06:52 PM.
Last edited by Barret on 20-Jun-2009 at 06:51 PM.

@Barret

Quote:

Ok I have confirmed that none of the Sam Flex graphics issues happen running Debian and KDE on the Flex 667 Mhz with the full 1 Gig of Ram Installed!

I dont think anyone really believes that the Sam boards are faulty. I think the Linux test which was suggested was for those who didnt realise (or maybe doubted) that the problem exists in Sam's OS4.1 currently.

@jahc

Actually now that I have made all of those changes including putting Kickstart on an SFS/00 partition, installing Linux on another, ect, OS 4.1 is currently running with the full amount of ram and no issues at all. I have no idea what fixed it but I am quite pleased.

@Barret
Quote:

Actually now that I have made all of those changes including putting Kickstart on an SFS/00 partition, installing Linux on another, ect, OS 4.1 is currently running with the full amount of ram and no issues at all. I have no idea what fixed it but I am quite pleased.

Did you remember to plug the SATA connector back into J23 and any other changes you made to get rid of the black dots on the Amiga side??

_________________
X1000 with 2GB memory & OS4.1FE

@Xenic

Not only that but I tested the CD/DVD to make sure it still works and didn't bring back the "dots". It's been running like that for hours now including cold starts-reboots, ect. I hope it stays fixed

@Barret
Quote:

Not only that but I tested the CD/DVD to make sure it still works and didn't bring back the "dots". It's been running like that for hours now including cold starts-reboots, ect. I hope it stays fixed.

Unbelievable. I just changed my alternate boot boot partition to SFS/0 and that fixes everything on my system too. Not only that; but I can boot with my FFS partiton and get the graphics corruption, then reboot and select my SFS partition in the early boot menu and the system boots with no graphics corruption. The KickStart files were loaded from the FFS partition but booting the rest of the system from the SFS partition fixes everything. The entire system seems to be working faster too. The system now boots so fast that the splash window is just a nuisance. I guess you can turn your fan back around now

_________________
X1000 with 2GB memory & OS4.1FE

@Xenic

On my system as it is right now the Kickstart files load from an SFS/00 partition and the System files load from an FFS partition with Long filename support (what is that called?) This seems to be working for me.

Is there any benefit to making the system file partition SFS too? I really don't know anything about the newer file systems as I never played with them on my Classic systems.

@Barret

SFS is faster (can be much faster) and doesn't go thru that whole "validating" sequence which can take a LONG time if you happen to crash during hard disk access. I would recommend it for sure.

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AmigaOS 4.x Beta Tester - Classic Amiga enthusiast - http://www.hd-zone.com is my Amiga Blog, check it out!

@HammerD

Ok, so I switched all of my Amiga partitions over to SFS/00 and the system is faster and the graphics problems with both memory modules installed is gone. Switch back to a boot partition with FFS and the problems come back. Maybe we are getting somewhere. Thanks for all of the help.

-Jeff

Last edited by Barret on 21-Jun-2009 at 11:40 AM.

@Barret

IIRC Joerg once said that were some issues between the caching system of SFS and FFS

; Basic filesystems and related modules
;
MODULE Kickstart/CDFileSystem
MODULE Kickstart/diskboot.config
MODULE Kickstart/diskboot.kmod
;MODULE Kickstart/FastFileSystem
;MODULE Kickstart/FileSystem.resource.kmod
;
; More filesystems and related modules
;
MODULE Kickstart/diskcache.library.kmod
MODULE Kickstart/SmartFileSystem

if used both onto the same system.

Correct me if i get it wrong (or if has been fixed in a recent update)

Last edited by Framiga on 21-Jun-2009 at 09:37 AM.

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