So I turn on my Apple II+ today, and I'm greeted with:
It's a D6BB error, kicking me straight to the monitor. I guess it's one of the RAM chips, but I don't know. Has anybody seen this before? I pulled out all my cards and I still get the error.
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Power up holding the open apple key down and see if it goes away.
Holding the open-apple key down on bootup forces the machine to wipe the RAM clean. That might point the way to a problem.
Also, if you power up with the closed-apple key down it will go to self-diagnostic mode and will tell you if there is a RAM problem.
If the machine is enhanced it will tell you what RAM chip, if any, is bad, too.
That's an Apple II+. It doesn't have any apple keys.
I would start by reseating the ROM chips. When an error happens afther the machine hasn't been used for a while, it's almost always due to a bad socket connection.
Is there an Open Apple Key on a Apple II+?
I do see a REPT key and the RESET key. Or is there another combination to clear the RAM?
This is also a misconception. It does cause a cold boot but that only clears a couple of bytes in each page of RAM.
I could start pushing on chips, but it was running fine last night. So I didn't just open it up recently.
Oops - sorry I made a wrong assumption (and didn't look closely enough at the photo)
There is no open-apple key, no closed-appel key and no startup diagnostic.
If it crashes to the monitor on startup there could be any number of things wrong, but the most common may be that there is a fault in the lower 16K of RAM.
The way I go about it on the II+ is first to remove all cards and try again. Replacing a card at a time if the error goes away...
Then I remove all the cards and the upper bank of RAM
Then the middle bank of RAM until there is only the lower 16K on the motherboard.
That is the RAM in row "C". It should boot properly to Applesoft with just 16K of RAM.
If it doesn't then take that row out and then install the RAM you removed from row "D" into row "C".
If it fixes the problem then there is a bad chip in the lower 16K.
Which chip? Unknown without further testing. You can install that suspect row in the top bank (Row "E") and try running a diagnostic utility like Apple-Cillin to narrow down the fault.
If the fault still does not go away after sawpping around the RAM, then there is most likely a RAM or ROM addressing issue.
Also, someone said to remove and reseat all the chips - this oftentimes fixes a slew of issues due to poor oxidized connections that are suddenly wiped clean byt the action of removing and reinserting.
So I went ahead and pushed on some chips. All the smaller ones closer to the keyboard. I did hear a creak when I pushed on the first ones by the power supply. And now it's working again. I think maybe running the machine longer last night, and then having it cool, could've shifted things. But now I'm a little afraid to turn it on. :/
I wouldn't be worried too much if pressing on the RAM ics helped. As others said it could literally be corrosion on a socket pin or something simple. Whether it's a permanent fix or not time will see but don't fear turning the thing on; check voltages if you want is a next good precaution.