MicroMac MultiSpeed Accelerator won't boot

AndyDiags

Tinkerer
Dec 18, 2021
91
161
33
I could use some help getting my Accelerator fixed.

I recently got a Mac Plus with this MicroMac MultiSpeed Accelerator installed. I'm, however, having issues booting from it.
The initial boot screen is fine, but when the logo is supposed to animate off-screen, I get a snowy screen instead, and the system locks up.


Below are the images of the board from when I first got the system and pulled it out.
IMG_2784.jpeg
IMG_2785.jpeg


IMG_2786.jpeg
IMG_2787.jpeg
IMG_2788.jpeg



Initially, when I received the system, it wouldn't boot at all. Upon close inspection, I noticed the CPU pins were bent on the socket. My guess is that the previous owner tried to do some troubleshooting by pulling the board off and back on, which caused the pin to be bend.
IMG_2783.jpeg
IMG_2781.jpeg


I carefully managed to bend the pins back into place.
I noticed some minor cold joints at the cable connector, so I resoldered those.
I pulled the ROM chip out to verify it was reading well; when I did so, I noticed one of the legs was barely hanging on due to rust, so I burned and put in a new eprom.
This finally takes me to where I'm stuck now.

The system boots with the logo as shown in the video (no bong), then locks up with snow instead of animation. I expect a bong and the MicroMac to animate horizontally off the screen, then the system should bong and continue booting. Here is a clip of the expected behavior.

Here's some of the troubleshooting I did so far.
  • I've tested with a different Mac Plus logic board and get the same issue
  • I've reseated the CPU
  • I've tested the four 4MB ram sticks in a ram tester and all the stick pass
  • I've put in a different set of 4MB RAM sticks and get the same issue
  • I've recapped all the electrolytic capacitors, still same issue (there were no signs of any leaks under any capacitors)
  • I've cleaned the board and carefully checked for any damaged traces but don't see any
  • I've tested with the original ROM eprom chip and get the same issue
I'm stuck here. 🌧️

One interesting thing is that if I replace the 4MB sticks with 1MB sticks, I get a RAM error on boot.
IMG_3996.jpg


The error reads

Code:
MEMORY ERROR
TEST ADDRESS  $00000039
TEST DATA     $00000000
RESULT DATA   $0000007B

The error varies on every boot; "test address" is between 1 and 31, while the "result data" is between 1 and 7B. I initially thought this was probably expected as the jumpers are most likely configured to only accept 4MB sticks, and I can't find any documentation on the jumpers. I recently found this post where the seller states he has 1MB sticks in there, and the jumper settings are the same. So perhaps this clue is meaningful, and there's some error with the RAM (e.g. bad trace?)


Final note, this Mac Plus also came with a working internal hard drive, I see that this system was last working 15 years ago. Seems this issue is what caused the previous owner to sell the system.
 

AndyDiags

Tinkerer
Dec 18, 2021
91
161
33
Small update.

I figured out why I was getting the MEMORY ERROR when trying the 1MB sticks.
It turns out all the different RAM sticks I tried were too slow, the RAM on the acceleration card needs to be really fast.

I tried with these 1MB IBM sticks, and the system was able to show the MicroMac logo instead of the MEMORY ERROR message.
Screenshot 2024-09-18 at 1.48.17 AM.png


Unfortunately, the system still hangs at the logo.

My guess is that one of the other components on the board has gone bad. Here's a quick lick of all of them:

2x - N74F543D - Scientific Solutions Octal registered transceiver, non-inverting (3-State)
1x - F244 - Motorola MC74F244DW Octal Buffer Line Driver
1x - LS09 - Motorola 74LS09 Quad 2-Input AND Gates with Open
1x - 74F74D - Scientific Solutions Dual D-Type Positive Edge-Triggered Flip-Flop
3x - F574 - Octal Edge-Triggered D-Type Flip-Flop with 3-State Outputs
1x - 68030 @ 50 mhz
1x - CALMOS CD130005A

These boards use the same CALMOS chip and software used on the NewLife accelerators. I did manage to find instructions for those. It seems the current jumper settings is set to support 4MB or 16MB total. If I want to use 0MB or 1MB, I'd need to change the jumper settings.
 

KennyPowers

Active Tinkerer
Jun 27, 2022
264
310
63
Do you have an SE you can try it in without the adapter boards for the Plus, just to verify the problem is on the accelerator itself?

My Multispeed (that's my video :) ) had some cap leakage, but surprisingly the two data line continuity breaks I found were bad vias that weren't really near obvious cap leakage. I guess my point is maybe do some continuity sanity checks even if you don't see anything questionable. And check your soldering on your new caps. You can probably forego checking continuity on connections to the SIMM slots or I would think that accelerator's RAM test would display an error before showing you the splash screen.

Also, that 030 being labeled as a 50Mhz part makes me wonder if that's the original CPU. I'm pretty sure your accelerator actually runs at 25Mhz even though there's a 50Mhz oscillator on it. I think the Multispeed was only available in 16Mhz, 25Mhz, and 32Mhz speeds. A lot of these accelerators overclocked their CPUs, not underclocked. If MicroMac had enough 50Mhz 030s laying around that they could put them on 25Mhz accelerators, then I wanna know why they put 33Mhz 030s on two of my 50Mhz accelerators 😆 If that's not the original CPU, it could be a remarked one. Even if it is, I wouldn't think it would have trouble running at 25Mhz, but trying a different CPU is an easy thing to do just to rule that out. My Multispeed has the same 50Mhz oscillator, but the 030 is marked as a 20Mhz part.

Also, I'm pretty sure these are NewLife accelerators that MicroMac bought/licensed. Here's the top of ROM 3.1:

Screenshot 2023-02-23 at 10.20.07 PM.png


I ran across someone at VCFMW last week who had one of these in an SE with ROM 2.7 and his splash screen said "NewLife" instead of "MicroMac", even though the PCB said "MicroMac" like yours and mine.
 

KennyPowers

Active Tinkerer
Jun 27, 2022
264
310
63
Is R102 connected to the oscillator's ground pin? I can't see if there's a trace in that gap there.

1726640863202.png


Mine doesn't even have R102...looks like a pulldown resistor on the oscillator's output? Yours looks newer than mine...