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From: magaj@levels.sait.edu.au
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.hardware
Subject: Help wanted about A500 crashes
Message-ID: <16200.280c107f@levels.sait.edu.au>
Date: 16 Apr 91 23:38:15 GMT
Organization: University of South Australia
Lines: 56



   I am becoming very weary of my A500 crashing at random intervals. I
have been reluctant to take my machine in for repairs because the problem
is not reproducible at will, and I don't have any idea about what causes it.

   Here are the symptoms:

   - Every now and again my A500 will reboot itself in the middle of
     whatever I am doing. It is not the software that I am running
     because I use that all the time, usually without a hitch.

   - Increasingly these days, it will reboot itself in the middle of
     one of these reboots, then reboot in the middle of that, etc.,
     sometimes as much as five times!

   - Often the capslock light will flash, and the keyboard won't respond.
     Usually I just warm-reboot with ctrl-left-amiga-right-amiga and the
     keyboard responds again.  Increasingly these days, this will not do
     the trick. If this happens, I pull the thing apart, have a look
     inside, see nothing wrong, put it back together, and hey presto! it
     works again.

   - The other day I had it pulled apart and rebooted it. Most of the
     startup-sequence ran but the machine suddenly guru'd for no apparent
     reason. Upon rebooting again (both warm and cold reboots) it just
     gave me a dark gray screen and nothing else.  I have never had either
     of these responses before.  After leaving it off for a few hours
     (in frustration), I put it back together again and it decided to work.


   Notes:

   - I have a filter for my power supply

   - During these attacks, if I am using my modem it remains powered-up,
     on-line and connected the whole time. After the rebooting has
     stabalised, I can re-use my modem connection as if nothing had gone
     wrong.

     i.e. I don't think the problem lies with my power supply.

   - The chips are all firmly seated, some cool, some lukewarm. The 68000
     has a single hot-spot. Is this normal?


   I know it is usually impossible to tell the trouble without examining
the machine, but I am hoping that someone has an idea about what might be
wrong, so I can be explicit when taking it in for repairs.  I know little
about hardware, and would prefer not to offer any repairer the chance to
make a dishonest buck by telling me that all sorts of things are wrong with it.


   Thanks in advance,

   Geoff Jarrad