dedina@cup.portal.com (Michael J Dedina) (11/11/88)
Ocassionally when I boot my A500 the caps-lock key flashes steadily on and off, and the keyboard locks up. The machine boots succesfully, however, and the mouse works and I can use workbench. Usually if I shut off the power and wait a few minutes, the problem goes away. Does anyone know what a flashing caps-lock key means?
mikhe@majestix.liu.se (Mike Henry) (11/15/88)
In article <11168@cup.portal.com> dedina@cup.portal.com (Michael J Dedina) writes: >the power and wait a few minutes, the problem goes away. Does anyone >know what a flashing caps-lock key means? For those of you who don't have TransAmi #3 (UK) B^); At startup the keyboard does a self test and flashes the CAPS_LOCK as a reply, if anything has gone wrong: One Blink The Keyboard ROM check failed Two Blinks The Keyboard RAM check failed Three Blinks The Watchdog timer test failed Four Blinks A short exists between two row lines or one of the seven special control keys. Maybe this'll help ya' B^) -Mike -- INET : mikhe@majestix.liu.se /// UUCP : {seismo,mcvax,munnari}!enea!liuida!majestix!mikhe /// ARPA : mikhe%majestix.{ida.liu.se,UUCP}@seismo.CSS.GOV \\\/// What SNAIL: Mike Henry, Alsattersg. 3C:20, S-582 51 Linkoping SWEDEN \XX/ Else??
kim@amdahl.uts.amdahl.com (Kim DeVaughn) (11/16/88)
In article <1040@majestix.liu.se>, mikhe@majestix.liu.se (Mike Henry) writes: > For those of you who don't have TransAmi #3 (UK) B^); > At startup the keyboard does a self test and flashes the CAPS_LOCK > as a reply, if anything has gone wrong: > > One Blink The Keyboard ROM check failed > Two Blinks The Keyboard RAM check failed > Three Blinks The Watchdog timer test failed > Four Blinks A short exists between two row lines or > one of the seven special control keys. Good stuff to know ... should be in the Tech Ref manual(s), at least, along with the screen colors (and power led codes, if there are any). However ... I think the original poster of this article was wondering what it means when it starts continuously blinking for no apparent reason once you've been up and running for awhile (and the keyboard is locked, and if you wait awhile, the machine'll probably crash). First, if you have a 2000, and catch the condition before the machine crashes (or gets sent a reset signal by the keyboard ?), quickly unplugging and re- plugging the keyboard cable may "clear" the condition. It did for me (easier if you have an extension cable between Amy and the keyboard). When this condition finally became too frequent to be bearable for me (and thus was happening often enough to try and isolate the problem), I eventually tracked it down to very ugly looking solder joints where the keyboard's crystal is soldered to the board. I re-soldered those two connections, and haven't had a problem since. When I responded to a similar problem awhile back here on the net, I got some email from the person that was having the problem. He said he'd resoldered several points near his 500's keyboard and that solved the problem for him too. He didn't mention the xtal joints in particular, but that's where I'd start looking ... try tapping on various components to see if you can localize it to a "sensitive area", then do a close visual inspection, looking for poor joints, etc. Make sure any socketed components are well seated as well (if there are any). If working on h/w isn't something you're comfortable with, have someone who is used to troubleshooting things do it for you. Hope this helps ... /kim -- UUCP: kim@amdahl.amdahl.com or: {sun,decwrl,hplabs,pyramid,uunet,oliveb,ames}!amdahl!kim DDD: 408-746-8462 USPS: Amdahl Corp. M/S 249, 1250 E. Arques Av, Sunnyvale, CA 94086 BIX: kdevaughn GEnie: K.DEVAUGHN CIS: 76535,25
space@sns.UUCP (Lars Soltau) (11/17/88)
In article <1040@majestix.liu.se> mikhe@majestix.liu.se (Mike Henry) writes: > At startup the keyboard does a self test and flashes the CAPS_LOCK > as a reply, if anything has gone wrong: > > One Blink The Keyboard ROM check failed > Two Blinks The Keyboard RAM check failed > Three Blinks The Watchdog timer test failed > Four Blinks A short exists between two row lines or > one of the seven special control keys. I do hope you're not referring to the A2000 keyboard here, because every time I a) switch on my Amy or b) press the magic three buttons my CapsLock LED flashes one time. If this DOES mean bad ROM, I've never noticed any problems. -- Lars Soltau UUCP: ...uunet!unido!sns!space BIX: -- no bucks -- Here's looking at you, kid! -- the Medusa