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From: denbeste@cc5.bbn.com.BBN.COM (Steven Den Beste)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: A happy memory expansion story
Message-ID: <167@cc5.bbn.com.BBN.COM>
Date: Fri, 7-Aug-87 08:15:28 EDT
Article-I.D.: cc5.167
Posted: Fri Aug  7 08:15:28 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 9-Aug-87 02:42:36 EDT
Organization: Bolt Beranek and Newman, Cambridge, MA
Lines: 43


Someone else talked about their woes with a memory expansion, so I thought
I would publish a happy story about one - the "Insider".

It is a board which goes inside the Amiga, sitting between the 68000 and the
mother board.

The installation procedure is somewhat elaborate because you have to take the
Amiga apart. The store I bought it from offered to install it for $25, but I
said "I'm an engineer, I can handle this..."

The instructions for installation are clear and extremely well written. It
took about an hour and a half, and worked perfectly the first time, and has
been working perfectly ever since. I have absolutely no complaints about this
- for $350 (plus $17.50 for Governer Dukakis) I consider it a bargain.

The only warning I would make is: Both the Insider and the Amiga are loaded
with CMOS. Do the installation on a humid day, and touch something grounded
just before you touch either of them.

Oddly enough, the 68000 itself is NMOS, and isn't very sensitive - this is a
good thing, because you have to pull this chip for the installation.

The only thing I had trouble with was a grounding lead they require between
the Amiga mother board and daughter board. I remember rumors of the early
Insiders having problems with noise - this is evidently the solution. It
requires hooking onto a resistor on the underside of the daughter board, and I
COULD NOT get it to hook on. I ultimately soldered a wire onto the pad where
the correct end of the resistor was, and hooked onto that wire. This isn't the
fault of the people who designed the Insider - they are correcting an Amiga
problem, and in my case the lead of the resistor was snugged down so far that
the clip simply wouldn't fit.

To close on a positive note, I repeat that the product seems to be a good one,
and the extra space is really nice. Now I can run Draw/plus without being told
how little memory I have every ten seconds!

-- 

     Steven C. Den Beste
     Bolt Beranek & Newman, Cambridge MA
     denbeste@bbn.com  (ARPA or CSNET or UUCP)
     harvard!bbn.com!denbeste (UUCP)