Sx-1 in desperate need for a fix - video card issue UPDATE: Solved

[Rodrigo]

UPDATE 05/10/2016 : SOLVED Read New Posts at the bottom

I’m an audio enthusiast from Argentina and college Sound Engineer student. I own an SX-1 which I love, but now it’s not working properly after a Thunder Storm electric shock…That machine is my life and work source so i'mtemporarily without a job and my studio is closed. I already tried to fix it by all possible means with no avail. Some people have pointed me out Redbus could be of good help with this issue!
I will now proceed to detail the troubleshoot/issue, I know it’s a long text but I would be forever grateful if somebody with he proper knowledge reads it through.

Facts:

-My SX-1 was connected to a surge protector/UPS and had a LCD Monitor though VGA cable that was connected to a regular AC outlet (unprotected). The electric shock passed though the AC outlet to the monitor and then trough the VGA cable to the SX-1 video card and burned it.

-The SX-1 boots and works fine, but the Video Card does NOT. It displays the interface in dimmed grayscale, which makes it near impossible to work with for more than 5 min without severe eye fatigue.

So me and my brother worked tirelessly trying to troubleshoot the issue and fix it with no avail in the following order:

1-Tried to make the burned video card to work again:

Changed every setting in the Bios related to video - Made a clean install of BeOS 1.52 in a different HDD - Took out the motherboard battery for Bios hard reset

Asides for the grayscale issue, we could not determinate the cause of this problem looking visually to the video card…all capacitors looks ok, mosfets, smd resistors…nothing looks “burned” even with a magnifying glass. We changed the original APM3055L mosfet with a MTP3055E to troubleshoot if it was a voltage issue. Since it displays a dimmed grayscale picture we thought it could not be receiving the right amount of voltage.

2- Tried with lots of different VGA videocards from the same year span (ATI-NVIDIA):

They boot and outputs video signal in color but with a smaller resolution (it looks like under the influence of a zoom, cutting off a lot of the screen UI. For example: in the channel view, it’s impossible to reach the EQ or the compressor settings cause they’re “outside the screen”), so you miss a lot of the interface (its not an option)

3- Bought a video card replacement for the SX-1 from Ebay, the ATI Xpert 2000 Pro 32 MB VGA 2x AGP:

It boots and output video signal in color with the wrong resolution (you miss a lot of the interface, as before). We ran the BeOs install disc and started the “Diagnostic Test” function, all the cards seems to be “detected” for an exception of the videocard which shows up to be “UNREACHABLE” WITH EVERY SINGLE REMPLACEMENT WE TRIED.

I just don’t understand why it’s not detected. Is somebody aware if the Tascam engineer team asked ATI for a modified version of the ATI Xpert 2000 Pro? Could it be that they used different drivers than the OEM version?

DO SOMEBODY KNOW A WAY TO CHANGE VIDEO RESOLUTION IN THE SX-1? The main interface lacks any kind of “resolution” menu even in the Settings section. You can change the video refresh rate but not the resolution. IS THERE ANY HIDDEN TRICK WE MAY HAVE MISSED?

At this point we’re on lost tracks. Could it be fixed by touching something in the motherboard? I’m starting to think about crazy fixes like some tweaking of the BeOs injecting the right drivers so it can detect the new videocard and output the correct resolution…I’m really lost.

Its truly sad for us to have this wonderful machine not functional for such a silly but nevertheless important issue of not outputting the correct resolution and not having any kind of menu to fix/change that.
But we are optimistic it can be fixed, it must be fixed, there must be a way...i just haven't found it yet. We really need this machine and can't afford a new one (even if we could its very hard to find one for sell).

Any kind of help will be appreciated !

 

[wkrbee]

Sounds like you took out the M/B.

 

[Rodrigo]

Sorry mate, i did not understand what you tried to say wkrbee

 

[Rodrigo]

I tried with a new ATI Xpert 2000 Pro from Israel and it didn't fix the issue (still not detected, wrong resolution)
Anybody else out there who could help us...?

 

[wkrbee]

To clarify:Since reloading the OS still does not fix the problem,some thing-most likely the portion of the Motherboard- that "talks" to the video card is damaged.That means the MB,(Motherboard),probably is damaged.

 

[RedBus]

Have you tried a different VGA cable? If the cable was fried, the monitor can't tell the VGA card what resolutions it supports, so the VGA card will default to 640x480. The monitor itself could have been damaged as well. If swapping both those doesn't fix it, the only thing remaining is the Motherboard.

 

[Rodrigo]

UPDATE 05/10/2016 IT'S WORKING - Read if you have the same issue

After lot of searching we came up with the solution !
The reason we were having Overscan issues is simple: the replacement Video Cards were not 100% compatible with the SX-1...
Why? Because the original used by the Tascam is the "ATI Xpert 2000 Pro" (which is almost imposible to find on eBay, and even harder to find detailed info-support) and the ones we bought (We order one from Germany and a seccond unit from Israel) were "ATI Xpert 2000 Pro ULTRA"...that little diference even if they look exactly the same matters, they have diferent chipset and so use diferent drivers, in conclution they are not the same card.


If you dont have a compatible graphic card, you can still run the SX-1 in VESA mode using the lowest common denominator SuperVGA "safe boot" graphics mode (640 by 480, 8-bit grayscale at worst; you can do better if your graphics card is VESA 2.0-compliant). This is the reason the video output was overscaning the image and not showing the complete interface.


The following graphics add-in cards are supported by BeOS:

• 3D Blaster Banshee
• ASUS V3200
• ATI All-In-Wonder [Pro], Xpert@Work [Pro/98], Rage 128 Pro (may require free driver from BeBits.com)
• Canopus Total3D 128V
• Diamond Viper V330, 550, 770, Stealth II G460, and Monster Fusion
• Intel Express 3D
• Matrox Mystique, Mystique 220, Mystique G200; Millenium G400, Millennium II, Millennium II AGP; Marvel G400-TV, and Productiva G100
• Real3D Starfighter
• STB Voodoo3 2000, 3000, 3500; Velocity 128 and 440C

Graphics Chipsets : The following graphics chipsets, used on many other add-in graphics cards and the built-in graphics on many computer motherboards, are supported by BeOS:

• Voodoo3 (2D only) and Banshee (2D only)
• ATI 3D Rage II, Pro, Pro Turbo, LT Pro, and Rage 128 Pro
• Diamond Monster Fusion (uses Vodoo Banshee chipset)
• Intel i740 and i810
• Matrox MGA-G100, MGA-G200 and MGA-G400 (PCI or AGP)
• NeoMagic 128, 128XD, and 256AV (laptop specific chipsets)
• nVidia RIVA 128, TNT, and TNT2 (PCI or AGP)
• SiS 5598, 6326, and 620 on-board graphics
• S3 Virge, Virge DX, and Virge GX (but not VX or HX)
• Trident MVP4

The SX-1 runs its own modified version of BeOs name by them (V1.52)...which is actually based on the R5 PE/Pro ("Maui") BeOS release ...so we are talking about a really rare and unpopular operative sistem that pretty much nobody knows/care...but nevertheless is still using BeOs architecture

As your machine starts to boot BeOS, hit the SPACEBAR (as soon as theTASCAM splash screen appears). This will bring up a menu of boot options. Scroll down to “Fail-Safe Video” and you’ll see a menu of possible resolutions. Select one from the list, navigate back to the main menu, and select “Continue Booting.” BeOS should come up in the selected resolution.
If it works, you’ll want to make this a permanent setting so you don’t have to do this every time.
Rename the file ~/config/settings/kernel/drivers/sample/vesa.sample to
~/config/settings/kernel/drivers/vesa.






We selected 1024 x 768 x 16

SO IT WORKS AND WE ARE FREAKING HAPPY !!!
We hope this helps someone else in the future



Here are some old pics where we were using the SX-1