Hi
Does anyone know what could be wrong with a Transwarp I just picked up?
I have an apple //e enhanced that runs fine. I am running it with a 1MB mem card in the Aux slot and 5.25 controller in slot 7.
When I insert the Transwarp into slot 3 (set to allow the 5.25 controller 1Mhz access and with the card set to standard 1Mhz speed) my iie will not boot up, i get;
1) no beep
2) a constant red internal power on light
3) a series of "blocks" on the screen (sometimes coloured, sometimes black and white)
It will not reset using the keyboard.
I cannot run any of the self-test routines for the transwarp.
The RAM area of the Transwarp feels like it heats up quickly (I don't know if this is normal)
I have taken out and reseated the chips on the Transwarp.
I know this is probably trivial to people but I don't know what I'm doing wrong 
Remove the Transwarp and check the overall condition
of the card. Especially the gold contact "fingers".
Clean them with a rencil eraser to brighten the contacts
for better conductivity. Next remove all of the RAM chips
and check ALL of the fingers on the chips. It's easy to
bend a "finger" on these chips and cause a misconnection.
Reseat all of the RAM chips firmly in their sockets.
ALso make sure that the RAM chips notches (on the ends)
match up with the notches on the RAM sockets (this is
easy to overlook and can cause the problems you mentioned).
Check and see if the CPU chip is firmly seated and properly
oriented (notches again) in its socket.
Next make sure that you don't have any cards in the AUX
slot as this may conflict with the Transwarp causing an
"arguement" between the devices (yup, that's a correct,
if ancient, computer term).
Finally check ALL of your peripheral device connections,
such as drive controllers, cables to drives, monitors,
etc. Check not only for tightness, but for proper polarity.
It is easy to accidentally reverse polarity with those old
device connectors as they are not always "foolproof".
The only other suggestions I have is that you may have
some damaged RAM chips or, worse, a damaged CPU chip on
the Transwarp. These can be replaced by cannibalizing an
old video card for RAM chips or an old Apple motherboard
for the CPU chip.
Hope some of this helps you.
Good luck and keep us posted.
Hi
Thanks for the response.
So far I have swapped the CPU from the Transwarp into the iie and it boots fine and swapped RAM from a working iigs RAM card with similar chips (although I didn't look for notches so, possibly d'oh).
Have checked all the chips for pin connections and reseated them (with the above exception of not checking the notches on the RAM chips)
I have checked all device connectors etc. and everything runs fine without the Transwarp inserted.
Have tried booting with the Transwarp with and without an aux. card in - same effect.
One curiousity, booting the iie without the transwarp AND without a CPU (I know, I know)gives the same boot crash, same two colour blocks on the screen, could this help me to tell what the error is on the Transwarp?
I will clean the contacts and check the RAM positions tonight (quick question: will alcohol wipes be good for cleaning the contacts?)
Thanks
Yes, alcohol is a good cleaner. You should be
careful around plastics, though, as alcohol
can disolve most plastics. Yes, check the RAM
chip orientation in their sockets. Did you also
check the CPU chip orientation in its socket on
the Transwarp as well? It, too, has a polarity
notch on the chip and socket. The only other
thing I can think of is possible a broken or
defective connection at the CPU socket and the
circuit board. Check with a good magnifier on
bothe sides of the circuit board in the area of
the CPU socket. Also the CPU socket may be a bit
dirty, so you might try cleaning the contacts
with a toothpick soaked in alcohol. Don't get too
ham-handed as you can damage the contacts in the
socket.
Don't forget to wipe up any excess alcohol with a
clean, dry, lintless cloth.
Good luck.
I saw in your post that you are running your disk controller card in Slot-7. That may make a difference to the Transwarp. Apple recommends that you run your controller (at least the initial controller) card in Slot-6. Maybe the Transwarp is looking for the device in the right location and when it doesn't find it there it crashes...I'm still learning about my Apples so maybe others here will be able to help. I am having a controller problem of my own right now, too.
The Transwarp has a ROM chip on it. Does it have a cover over the little window? If it does not then there is your problem. The ROM chips used on the Transwarps are erasable, and exposure to light will erase them. GSE-Reactive has the 1.4 Rom chips for the Transwarps in stock.
Thanks for all the responses.
I cleaned down the contacts with a small amount of alcohol (they look new!) including the CPU contacts on the Transwarp.
Also checked the notch alignments on the chips.
I looked over the card but cannot see any obvious circuit breaks (Unfortunately the only magnifying glass I could get was my 5-year old's =D)
Have tried it with all other cards out (including the disk controller)
The ROM chip on the Transwarp I have does not seem to be a windowed one (wonder if this is the problem?).
Still not working though unfortunately
Can only think of a few more options;
a) Get someone to check the circuit (far beyond my abilities I'm afraid)
b) Replace the ROM (a la Littlejohn's suggestion)
One other thing is, I have an Applied Engineering catalogue with a blow-up of the Transwarp and the vast majority of the chips on my card differ to those on teh catalogue pic, would this be a problem or were they just made with whatever chips were available at the time?
Thanks
Chips may differ as far as production runs go
(different manufacturers, etc), but the chip
NUMBER should always be the SAME. That number
is the specific chip part number no matter WHO
the manufacturer might be. If you have chips
that have different NUMBERS, then that could be
a problem. Good check! You say that you 'picked
up' this Transwarp...like maybe *bay? If that
is the case, then possibly the previous owner
'harvested' the chips and filled the empty soc-
kets with either defective or wrong chips. If
that is the case, then you need to locate and
replace the chips with the CORRECT ones.
Just a long shot there...but you never know.
It has happened to folks before.
This MIGHT be the case with your RAM chips, that
the previous owner put some older chips that
were of dubious condition on the board just to
sell it.
Keep us posted.
Yup, correct. I like picking up unidentified lots cheap from [usual auction site] (is that not allowed to be mentioned btw?). I got the lot this was in mainly because of a load of apple ii books that were in it (particularly one on creating adventure games).
Given the nature of the rest of the bits from the auction I would say that nothing had been harvested (at least not purposely
), the TRanswarp was not listed in the auction lot it was just a pleasant surprise.
I know that my //e works fine and that the RAM and main CPU on the TRanswarp are fine, I will have to get someone to check the connections for the card etc.
The ROM's on the card have TWxx-Q btw (as well as the usual chip ident.) where xx is a letter then a number. I am assuming the TW stands for Transwarp?
On a completely unrelated point I swapped over the CPU from a iigs into my iie and it appears to work (faster) apart from glitching some chars (video ROM?), are they supposed to be interchangeable and am I in danger of frying my poor, abused iie?
I don't suppose anyone who is genius at getting this stuff working wants to swap the Transwarp for a Ramworks III?
Hi
Sorry to mither and everything but this got a little stranger. I tried a ZipChip (4Mhz) and I got the same "garbage blocks on the screen, no keyboard response, no floppy activity" as attempting to use the transwarp.
So, my apple //e runs fine with;
1) It's original 65c02
2) The CPU from the Transwarp (when taken out of the transwarp and put directly into the //e)
3) the Apple iigs CPU (a 65816 I think, doesn't run fine but it boots and runs basic etc.)
But will not work (and shows the exact same garbage on the screen) with;
1) the Transwarp card installed
2) the ZipChip installed
Is there something on a //e that doesn't like acceleration? (or a ROM that may have gone that could cause this)
On the positive side it may mean that my Transwarp is ok