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Re: GS Power supply / HD problem
Previously hades@u.washington.edu (What Illuminatus?) wrote:
>I left my GS on yesterday while I went downstairs to watch some TV. When
>I came back a couple hours later I found it had crashed, hard enough
>that my screen was rolling with some kind of static-like garbage.
>
>My hard drive (an AE Vulcan 40) was making a gravelly scratching sound,
>so I quickly turned the system off.
This sounds hauntingly familiar. My Vulcan failed the in a similar manner
in last December.
>I tried various things to see what the problem was, and I've narrowed it
>down to this: the power supply in the Vulcan is toast. It's not
>providing enough power, as far as I can tell.
My initial assumption was that the drive itself was suffering from drive
sticktion. So what I ended up doing was replacing the drive itself with a
Quantum Maverick 540 MB SCSI drive. I already had a RamFAST so I thought
this would be the best way to go.
However after doing the upgrade, I was plagued with mysterious crashes
that happened very frequently. After about two weeks the drive started
'spin down' as if power were turned off or something like that. I thought
the drive was faulty.
I then exchanged the drive for a DEC DSP3053L drive. But even with this
drive, my system kept on crashing. Jawaid thought it was my RamFAST
because it had some of the older faulty GAL chips. I sent it in for
repairs, but it still didn't solve my problems. Then one day my drive
kept on kicking in it's power on status as if it was continually being
turned on and off.
*PING PING PING!* That's three drives in a row that seemed to have
problems spinning up. So, I thought it was the power supply unit of my
GS. I problably shouldn't be surprised, after all up until I removed the
IDE drive and interface, I had all but one slot filled.
>I disconnected the power leads from the Vulcan to the GS. I plugged in
>an old GS power supply and threaded the power leads into the case and
>plugged them in. My power is now coming from an external supply, which
>can't be good for things.
I tried this too. I bought a used LC power supply and connected the drive
to it. Alas this still didn't solve the problem of my mysterious crashes.
So I thought, maybe my Vulcan power supply just can't cut it anymore. I
called up ABC Direct and asked if they had any extra Vulcan power
supplies and I ordered a used one. I popped it into my GS earlier this
week but bang! Still my system crashed.
Now I'm somewhat upset. I spent approximately $550CAN so far to get my GS
running but it still crashes. I've pulled out every card except my
TransWarp, RamFAST, and memory card and the problem still persisted. I
maybe looking at a failure of either my TransWarp or my memory card. I'm
assuming that my RamFAST is OK since I sent it in for the replacement of
a couple of chips so I assume that Sequential ran some diagnostics on it.
I hope it isn't my TransWarp as I really can't afford to replace it. And
the smart guy I am, I never brought my original CPU with me when I moved.
>Is this something I'm going to have to make permanent? Does anyone know
>if the power supply in an AE Vulcan can be fixed?
There is someone who does repair Vulcan power units but he really doesn't
like to. Parts are hard to find and he looses money in repairing them.
>If necessary, I guess I could get an extension cable and run it from the
>controller card out of the case to the HD. I'd rather the HD were
>external than the power supply.
>
>Or should I just give up on the Vulcan (I bought it used a couple months
>ago) and save up for a SCSI card and drive?
Well both these methods are alot cheaper than the route I went.
>And is it possible to buy new Apple power supplies? The one I'm using
>now I took from my second GS, which I had been planning on giving to my
>brother. Without a power supply, that'll be kinda hard.
ABC Direct sells some heavy duty power supplies for the GS too. You can
contact them at:
ABC Direct
18777 Midway #309
Dallas, TX 75287
(214) 306 5494
1 800 481 6782
abcdirect@aol.com
>Thanks for reading to the bottom... I know I've been rambling.
Me too! ^_^;
--
Herbert Fung herbertf@ersys.edmonton.ab.ca
Edmonton Remote Systems Serving Edmonton/Northern Alberta since 1982