********* Welcome to Project 64! http://project64.c64.org The goal of Project 64 is to preserve Commodore 64 related documents in electronic text format that might otherwise cease to exist with the rapid advancement of computer technology and declining interest in 8- bit computers on the part of the general population. If you would like to help by converting C64 related hardcopy documents to electronic texts please contact the manager of Project 64. Extensive efforts were made to preserve the contents of the original document. However, certain portions, such as diagrams, program listings, and indexes may have been either altered or sacrificed due to the limitations of plain vanilla text. Diagrams may have been eliminated where ASCII-art was not feasible. Program listings may be missing display codes where substitutions were not possible. Tables of contents and indexes may have been changed from page number references to section number references. Please accept our apologies for these limitations, alterations, and possible omissions. Document names are limited to the 8.3 file convention of DOS. The first characters of the file name are an abbreviation of the original document name. The version number of the etext follows next. After that a letter may appear to indicate the particular source of the document. Finally, the document is given a .TXT extension. The author(s) of the original document and members of Project 64 make no representations about the accuracy or suitability of this material for any purpose. This etext is provided "as-is". Please refer to the warrantee of the original document, if any, that may included in this etext. No other warrantees, express or implied, are made to you as to the etext or any medium it may be on. Neither the author(s) nor the members of Project 64 will assume liability for damages either from the direct or indirect use of this etext or from the distribution of or modification to this etext. Therefore if you read this document or use the information herein you do so at your own risk. ********* The Project 64 etext of the RAMBOard 1571 installation manual Converted to text by Wolfgang Moser , 2004-06-27 Some notes from the etexter: This eText contains the installation manual for Chip Level Design's 1571 RAMBOard. It was hardly tried to take over the original formatting as good as possible. Special non-7-bit ASCII chars used in this text: Ż : overstrike (used as understrike for paragraph headlines) Page breaks (ASCII char 12 resp. 0x0c) were used in this eText to itensify the orignal formatting even more. On page 1 the original graphics were replaced by ASCII charts of the C1571 mainboard. ********* 1571 R A M B O a r d(tm) Installation READ THESE INSTRUCTIONS AT LEAST ONCE AND UNDERSTAND THEM FULLY BEFORE ATTEMPTING THIS MODIFICATION. NEITHER THE DISTRIBUTOR, OR THE MANUFACTURER WILL BE HELD RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY DAMAGE INCURRED IN THE INSTALLATION OR USE OF THIS PRODUCT. W A R N I N G ! : This modification will void ANY Warranty now in effect on your disk drive. Proceed at your own risk. All RAMBOards have been tested and are in proper working order before we ship them. Please remember that you will be working with static sensitive devices, so prepare a work area with this in mind (a grounding source, no rugs, etc.). Also note that the RAMBOard itself is a fragile device. The pins are easily bent and may break off if not inserted properly. If after installing the RAMBOard the test program shows a non-functioning unit, please contact us as soon as possible at the Tech Support phone number. PREPARATION: ŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻ 1. Unplug all cables from the drive and turn it over so the bottom is facing up. Remove the four screws from the bottom of the case. Be sure to put them away where you'll be able to locate them later. 2. While holding both halves of the case, carefully turn the drive over so the top of the drive is facing up. Next, lift the top half of the case off and lay it aside. 3. Now, locate and remove the four screws holding the perforated power supply cage in place. When done, remove it's electrical connector at board location CN1. For reassembly purposes, notice that the flange end of that connector is pointed towards the outside of the PC board. Locate and remove the screws in the all metal grounding strap tying the power supply cage to the drive unit. Lift out the power supply from the lower case half. _ |ŻUŻ| |ŻUŻ| |ŻUŻ| |ŻUŻ| | | ** | | | | | | | | | | |ŻUŻ| | | | | | | | C | | | | | | | | | | | | I | | | ** | | | | | | | | | A | | | |U| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |_| | | | | | | | | | | | |** ŻŻŻ ŻŻŻ ŻŻŻ ŻŻŻ ŻŻŻ | |** ** ** ** |ŻUŻ| ** |ŻUŻ| |ŻUŻ| | | |U| |U| |U| | | ** | R | | | | | | | | | | | | | |U| | O | | | | | |_| |_| |_| | | | | | M | | | |_| _+# ** | | | | | | |___| MMMM ( )#|U| | | |_| |___| ** UUUU Ż #| | | | ** |ŻŻŻ| |ŻŻŻ| .-.#|_| |___| |___| |___| |_| ** 1571 RAMBOard PAGE [1] (c) 1989 CLD FINDING AND REMOVING THE CIA AND ROM CHIPS: ŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻ 1. Position the drive so that the front faces to your right and the rear to your left. Referring to the diagram on page one, locate and remove the CIA chip at board location U20, and the ROM chip at board location U2. Notice that the notches on both chips are located on the right end. 2. After identifying the CIA and ROM chips, remove them with a chip puller. If you don't have a chip puller, you may use a small flat-bladed pocket knife. Place the blade between the chip and the socket and rotate the blade. The chip will lift slightly at one end of the socket. Now repeat the procedure at the other end of the chip. Keep doing this until you can pull the chip straight out of the socket. Be patient! You DO NOT want to bend the pins on the chip! If you do bend the pins slightly, you may be able to straighten them, but be CAREFUL, these pins do not take well to bending. INSTALLING THE 1571 RAMBOard: ŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻ 1. After removing the two chips, and before beginning the installation procedure, thoroughly inspect your 1571 RAMBOard. The pins on the underside (Yes there are two cut off) will replace the chips just removed from the board. Carefully position the two boards into the empty sockets, making sure all pins line up properly. You may have to gently bend over some of the small round green or brown capacitors to provide clearance, so now is the time to check things out. When all looks o.k., firmly press each board in place until it fits flush against it's socket. Most problems will be avoided if you are certain that the two boards are PROPERLY SEATED. 2. Now place the chips, previously removed, into the empty sockets on the 1571 RAMBOard using the same caution as before. Remember the notch placement! The notch should be facing the front of the drive just as they were before you removed them. Press down on the cable tying the two RAMBOard PC boards together. Check for any damage (broken capacitors, etc.) or improper chip placement before going on to the next step. 3. Now, carefully place the power supply back into position and replace the two screws on the left hand side of the power supply (looking from the back). The two screws remaining may now be replaced but do not over-tighten. Because of extreme clearance limitations, the power supply will now be touching the chips in the 1571 RAMBOard. This will not cause any problems and will actually act as a heat sink for the CIA chip, which runs hot during normal drive operation. Again, DO NOT try to snug the drive screws down tight. Finally, replace the power supply electrical connector at board position CN1 (remember the flanges point to the outside of the PC board), and the grounding strap in it's former location. 1571 RAMBOard PAGE [2] (c) 1989 CLD TESTING AND FINAL ASSEMBLY: ŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻ 1. Before refitting the upper half of the drive case, connect the power cable and turn on the drive. If anything abnormal happens quickly turn the drive off. Remove the power supply and, once again, check for any visible damage or improper chip placement. If nothing abnormal happened, turn off the drive and go to the next step. 2. Connect the drive to the computer and run the test program (see below). If the program reports that the RAMBOard is not functioning properly, call the Technical Support line as soon as possible and we will try and resolve the problem. The technical support phone number is (206) 695-9648. Support is available Mon - Fri 9am-5pm Pacific Time. 3. If all checks out well with the test program, turn off the computer and drive. Remove all cables from the drive and replace the upper half of the drive case. Carefully turn the drive over and replace the four screws. Reconnect the power and serial cables and use the drive as normal. RAMBOard UTILITIES DISK: ŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻ All utilities run in the 64 mode! RAMBOard Test Program: The diskette that was packed along with your RAMBOard contains, among other things, an installation test program. With the RAMBOard Utilities diskette in the drive, type LOAD "RAMBOARD TEST " ,8,1 and press RETURN. At the READY prompt, type RUN and hit RETURN again. At this point, follow on screen prompts to determine if your RAMBoard is properly installed. Please note that the 1571 RAMBOard adds RAM to your drive at location $6000. Because the Maverick 8K parameters default to $8000, you will have to change the RAM location settings. 1541 Fast Data Copiers: With the RAMBOard Utilities diskette in the drive, type LOAD ":*" ,8,1 and press RETURN. At the READY prompt, type RUN and hit RETURN again. You will be presented with a menu asking if you wish the single or dual drive version of the Fast Data Copier. Press the 1 or 2 key to load the appropriate copier. Once the desired copier has loaded, a quick study of the menu screen will familiarize you with the options available. The copiers included with The RAMBOard have been designed to efficiently copy non-protected data from one diskette to another. They were not designed to handle copy protected programs. For that purpose, we strongly suggest the Maverick, also available from Software Support International. The Maverick software contains the parameter support for your 1571 RAMBOard. This combination of software & hardware is most powerful archiver ever developed for the Commodore 64/128. 1571 RAMBOard PAGE [3] (c) 1989 CLD Parallel Support: Your 1571 RAMBOard is equipped with a parallel cable connector. We have already begun work on an all new parallel utility package that will be supported through the Maverick. We'll keep you posted. ATTENTION C-128D OWNERS The 1571 RAMBOard is for external drives only. It will not install in the internal drive in your C-128D. LIMITED WARRANTY If at any time within 90 days of purchase, the RAMBOard or it's companion diskette become defective (abuse not included), you may use the blue return sheet included with your invoice to receive a replacement unit. We will repair or replace your defective RAMBOard as soon as possible. Replacements will be given at no charge, upon receipt of the defective item, postage paid. The 1571 RAMBOard Hardware Design :(c) Chip Level Design RAMBOard Test Program :(c) Chip Level Designs 1541/71 Fast Copiers :(c) K.J.P.B. Distributed By Software Support International 2700 N.E. Andresen Rd. Suite #A-1 Vancouver, Washington 98661 Order Line : 1 (800) 356-1179 Technical Line : (206) 695-9648 1571 RAMBOard PAGE [4] (c) 1989 CLD ********* End of eText: 1571 RAMBOard installation manual (english) *********