I am using, or trying to use, an AztecMonster CF in my non-turbo mono next slab. I can not get an installation of either NS 3.3 or Openstep 4.2 to happen. I get scsi timeouts and the AztecMonster simply gets stuck with its activity light on. I seem to get further depending on what CF card I am using, where some lock up during formatting and some lock while installing files, but none can install successfully. I looked online and found some people who were using the AztecMonster with Next computers and the closest computer I can find they used was a Turbo color NextStation. I bought the same exact Compact flash card as that guy had, but I still lock up during install. After several weeks of going back and forth with this, the manufacturer of the AztecMonster has offered to refund me , if I send the card back. While I am glad to have the offer , I am sort of disappointed that I could not get it to work (plus I don't have a hard drive!). The smallest card I tried to install to was 2 gigs. My last try is a 256MB flash card and I was wondering if there is a HARDWARE limit on drive size with the non tubo next station vs turbo? Anyone with an AztecMonster that can might have some advice is appreciated as well.
what firmware version is your AztecMonster running? are you sure your SCSI bus is properly terminated?
I use a lot of different CF cards. 1; 2; 4, or 8 GB of size. although I never create bigger partitions than 2 GB... so no, there's no limit that I know of.
read last post in this thread:
http://www.nextcomputers.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=3019
I ordered the AztecMonster based on your earlier posts of success among others comments of it working around the web. My other id on here is wizard1969, and was chatting with you. I can't get the admin to reactivate that account after I changed my email.
I requested 3.86 firmware when I initially ordered , which artmix provided loose. I tried that one, I don't see the timeout error on startup, but I do get the freeze up and timeout later during either install or formatting depending on which CF card I am using. He sent a bunch of other firmwares, none of which work any better. The only thing that seems to get me further is which CF I am using, but as I said I can not get through an install. I would do a network install but do not have anything.
The terminator is on (default on the card), the target is set to either zero or one (does not seem to matter). the CD-ROM has a built in terminator which is on and it is external (on a different bus) its set to 6. I even bought another SCSI CD-ROM drive , but that does not seem to make a difference. Can not get an install. Perhaps there is a conflict with the CDROM drive? The timeouts say the timeout is coming from target 0 or 1, so its the Aztec.
Could you make an image with dd of a successful OS4.2 CF card install? I wouldn't ask such a thing but I am pretty desperate and don't really want to return this hardware. I have spent an additional $200 on CF cards and CDROM drive! I host an ftp to upload to.
Thanks, I got the image! Well, first card to try, a 2 gig Transcend 133x, gives me an error:
http://polyex.com/RIMG0001.jpgI will try some more cards. When I tried to install with this card it would not even format, so hopefully I will get further with other ones.
Thanks again. There may be an incompatibility with non turbo mono stations and the Aztec.
Hey Wizard! I spoke to you in email. I do know that my Nextstation is a turbo color. Also, I am using no terminator on my Aztec.
Hey mikeboss, how do you tell what firmware the AztecMonster is using?
Success! After the failure with the 2gig Transcend , I went with a 4 gig Sandisk and it boots up. Note that this Sandisk will NOT install (fails while copying files). I am going to bang on it. No sound either, not sure what's going on there, perhaps because the image is from different hardware which used a soundbox? (ugh, one thing at a time). I might need to trouble you for a 4 gig image.
vash2k6: If I turn off the terminator off for the aztec (by jumpering the pins) when the Nextstation starts up it fails its hardware check. Not sure if that points to something in error or what, but I thought Next always wanted the internal drive terminated.
Interesting bit. Now that I have a booting system, I found that if I have an external cdrom plugged in , the Aztec Freezes up on bootup just like it used to with the install. As I needed the cdrom during install, this may be related to all my problems. There may be some incompatibility with both the CDROM, the next and the external drives perhaps? I have tried using both an NEC multispin and a generic sony drive (don't recall the model). Both act exactly the same.
I'm not sure about the termination jumper. IIRC there was a mixup in the documentation, meaning: term is on when jumpered...
EDIT: I just checked: I have NO jumper on my AztecMonster.
I move pre-installed operating systems betweeen different black hardware all the time without any problems. of course the release needs to support the hardware it is running on. NEXTSTEP 2.2 and up should run on all black hardware!
also I run the AztecMonsters on all kinds of black hardware: cubes (turbo and non-turbo). I do own stations too (turbo and non-turbo) and the AztecMonster works in all machines, as long as the firmware is the right one.
your station not giving any sound makes me suspicious. this points to failing capacitors. this also could be an explanation for the erratic behavior of the SCSI bus.
if possible check if the AztecMonster works on different hardware (for example a 68k Mac). also, I would try if a real SCSI harddrive will work in the NeXTstation.
I found the sound working in the headphone jack on the monitor, so I think the problem is in the monitor. Anyone know what to check on the monitor?
I purchased the CF AztecMonster a few months ago with the intentions of using it on my Quadra 660av since even very low power modern hard drives seem to overheat in that chassis. The adapter works very well with Mac OS, but unfortunately not so much with NetBSD. I think the biggest issue is the random I/O write latency of CF cards themselves causing brief lockups and SCSI timeout errors under NetBSD. However, none of this affects Mac OS where the setup works very well. I did not check the adapter with my slab since I have a reliable SATA / SCSI solution with an Acard adapter.
I also had a mixed experience with different types of CF cards. I first tried a Kingston Ultimate 266x 32GB card that did not work - it was erratic and on boot it took on the order of a minute to be detected by an Adaptec SCSI controller. I also tried the current 16GB SanDisk Extreme (gold label) that appears to work without the above issues, but for some strange reason the AztecMonster activity LED remains dimly lit with it. So far I had best luck with a 4GB SanDisk Extreme III card from one of my old cameras.
I exclusively use SLC-flash (Single Level Cell) based CF cards from PC Engines. no issues at all. the AztecMonster only failed me when I tried to use it for Apple's A/UX on a Quadra 700. but then again, A/UX is super-picky. it even failed to install to a real SCSI drive while I tried to use a longer SCSI ribbon cable....
they can be ordered from various resellers around the world:
http://pcengines.ch/order.phpproduct description:
http://pcengines.ch/cf2slc.htmhttp://pcengines.ch/cf4slc.htm
That's great to know, thank you for the info! I will give one of their cards a try.
I purchased ANOTHER NeXT slab from a user on here, this time a turbo. Same timeout errors with the new machine when using the Aztec while trying to install Openstep 4.2 or NS 3.3. Pretty frustrating! I just placed an order for one of these compact flash cards mentioned in the previous post, so we will see if that's it. Seems like if any other SCSI device is in use while the Aztec is, the Aztec freezes in different places depending on what brand of compact flash card you are using, so perhaps this will fix it (what's left other than I have a bad card?). When I used a hard drive on both these machines no problems occurred using an external CD-ROM in conjunction. Also I do not get any lockups using the Aztec when no other SCSI device is involved, but that may just be luck. I actually made a disk image from the Previous emulator and used dd to write it to a compact flash card which worked.
Received the PC Engines CF card. Kind of expensive ($25 + shipping for one 4 gig card). Timeout errors during install of 4.2, similar to what other cards were doing. ugh. This is running 3.86 firmware, which is supposed to be "NeXT compatible" I am throwing the towel in on this one. Between purchasing another nextstation, buying expensive CF cards, three different CD-ROM drives and the Aztec itself, I am out over $650.00 just trying to get this to work. As a warning to others, I would NOT recommend purchasing an Aztec card if your looking for a HD replacement for your NeXT especially if you expect a CD-ROM drive to work with it. It may work with a network install or other type of SCSI device, but it does NOT play nice with cd-rom drives at least the 3 different models I purchased.
sorry to read about your troubles with the AztecMonster. I own four cubes, 68030, '040 turbo and non-turbo boards. also a bunch of NeXTstations and '040 based Quadra and LC Macs. I also have a bunch of internal and external CD-ROMs I use with the NeXT and Apple computers. none of my four AztecMonsters gave me trouble in any of these systems (in combination with CD-ROM drives they worked flawless, too). I only saw hangs and SCSI timeout errors when firmware V 3.89 was installed. maybe you could try firmware V 3.7M which only gives one small error during boot but otherwise worked fine in my systems.
I tried that one with earlier cards, but will try again with the new card. Nothing to lose. Either I got a bad card (in which case I would recommend not buying one), or they changed something in the hardware from yours to mine.
I'd highly recommend the scsi2sd over the Artmix products. It's open source and is very well supported. It's available here:
http://shop.codesrc.com/I haven't used one myself yet, but I've heard many success stories. I have an older CF PowerMonster and couldn't get it to work reliably.
Quote from: "balrog"I'd highly recommend the scsi2sd over the Artmix products. It's open source and is very well supported. It's available here: http://shop.codesrc.com/
I haven't used one myself yet, but I've heard many success stories. I have an older CF PowerMonster and couldn't get it to work reliably.
yup, the SCSI2SD is being discussed in another thread already :wink:
http://www.nextcomputers.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=3371early system releases still don't boot on the SCSI2SD, AFAIK.
