Iprefs and TimeZone and PlayCD (oh, my!) [SOLVED]

klesterjr · Post by **klesterjr** » Wed Sep 05, 2012 2:19 am

In addition to needing Iprefs from update 4 to boot, there are a couple of minor issues I've run across ...

TimeZone freezes my machine when I try to run it. Could this be an indication of some sort of hw issue?

Also, PlayCD freezes the machine about 75% of the time I try to run it.

The machine is an XE with the onboard sound chip and a 9000 Pro card in the AGP slot (installed today!). The battery is new and the 512k simm passed memtester over night.

Other than these minor issues, the machine seems way more stable than my Micro was.

Edit: See last post for the solution!

Post by **tonyw** » Wed Sep 05, 2012 8:26 am

What is "TimeZone"? Do you mean Prefs/Locale/Time zone ?

PlayCD can't crash your machine - it's been around for years and no one has ever complained of crashes. Either you have something running that is crashing or you have a hardware problem. I'd be more inclined to look for some third party "add-on" that is causing a problem. BTW, capture a crash log. Without a crash log, we don't know what is crashing.

First resort: go back to your OS 4.1 CD (although it is Update 1) and boot that, then retest. You can abort the Installation, go to the Workbench and run the latest PlayCD from your current system disk. Check to see if it still crashes.

Last resort: format the system partition, install Update 1 from the CD and build up a new clean Update 5 partition. Keep that partition in a virgin state, then make another partition and copy the Clean Update 5 into it. That way you will always have a clean Update 5 partition to revert to if you have problems.

BTW, it's nonsense to claim that you need an old version of IPrefs. I don't, on my A1-XE, neither does any of the betatesters. It would be better to find the real problem.

trixie · Post by **trixie** » Wed Sep 05, 2012 10:08 am

tonyw wrote:PlayCD can't crash your machine.

True. The only thing that crashes in connection with PlayCD is my head, wondering why this ugly and largely useless bugger is still part of the OS?

Replacing it with something like Fredrik Wikstrom's PlayCDDA would make so much more sense!

klesterjr · Post by **klesterjr** » Wed Sep 05, 2012 1:34 pm

tonyw wrote:What is "TimeZone"? Do you mean Prefs/Locale/Time zone ?

When I try to run the Time Zone app in Prefs (or from the update 1 install CD) the machine crashes. I just checked and running the Locale & Time apps in Prefs crash in the same way. Anyway -- I kept stepping back until I found versions that worked and had to go all the way back to the OS 4.0 Developer Pre-release to find versions that worked with my machine. Of course, there was no Time Zone panel then (just Locale & Time).

PlayCD can't crash your machine

Heh, heh -- really? In this case, I was able to 'fix' the problem by reverting back to version 53.7 from update 4 (53.10 is the version that crashes).

This is a VIRGIN install -- there is no "third-party" software installed yet (unless wallpaper counts!)

None of these are big issues -- like I said the machine is VERY stable. Just a little nervous about mixing bits from old versions of the OS.

-Ken

Post by **tonyw** » Wed Sep 05, 2012 2:50 pm

If it really is a clean update 5 install, then it must be a hardware problem with your machine. The A1s were always touchy, and "successful" memory tests are no guarantee of trouble-free running.

You could try dropping the memory bus speed from 133 MHz down to 100 MHz - that made some of my 512 MB DIMMs work properly. And of course, you can only reliably run one DIMM at a time in most A1s (there are exceptions).

klesterjr · Post by **klesterjr** » Wed Sep 05, 2012 3:59 pm

tonyw wrote:If it really is a clean update 5 install, then it must be a hardware problem with your machine. The A1s were always touchy, and "successful" memory tests are no guarantee of trouble-free running.

You could try dropping the memory bus speed from 133 MHz down to 100 MHz - that made some of my 512 MB DIMMs work properly. And of course, you can only reliably run one DIMM at a time in most A1s (there are exceptions).

I agree that the IPrefs & time issues feels like a possible hardware problem (probably memory related). In the past adding 'wait 1' in SS for IPrefs has been helpful, but not this time. I have 4 memory sticks that are "supposed" to be compatible on the way -- I will play with those before resorting to anything drastic like changing the bus speed, core voltage, etc. (I'm VERY reluctant to do things like that).

format the system partition, install Update 1 from the CD and build up a new clean Update 5 partition.

You used to work at a Windows Help Desk, didn't you?

-Ken

Edit: Figured it out -- it WAS a sw issue after all. When the battery was changed, the system clock reverted to 2074 (or some such year) -- using an older version of the Time Prefs panel I was able to correct the date/time and now everything works (including IPrefs).

Edit 2: BTW -- this is repeatable (on my system, anyway). I changed the year back to 2074 and the same problems/crashes come back.

Post by **ssolie** » Wed Sep 05, 2012 5:00 pm

klesterjr wrote:Edit 2: BTW -- this is repeatable (on my system, anyway). I changed the year back to 2074 and the same problems/crashes come back.

Can you please describe the steps required to recreate the crash?

I'm wondering if this is a general problem or something to do with only the XE.

klesterjr · Post by **klesterjr** » Wed Sep 05, 2012 5:25 pm

Change the year (I used 2074) with the 'Time' Control Panel in Prefs and reboot. That's it.

With the SS echoing each step, it appears that IPrefs (from update 5) is hanging. Using IPrefs from Update 4 allows the system to boot, but then various Prefs Apps (and PlayCD) result in the system freezing (detailed above).

-Ken

ssolie wrote: Can you please describe the steps required to recreate the crash?

I'm wondering if this is a general problem or something to do with only the XE.

Spectre660 · Post by **Spectre660** » Wed Sep 05, 2012 5:39 pm

a system clock date related issue also appears in this tread .
http://forum.hyperion-entertainment.biz ... =17&t=1194

ssolie wrote:
klesterjr wrote:Edit 2: BTW -- this is repeatable (on my system, anyway). I changed the year back to 2074 and the same problems/crashes come back.
Can you please describe the steps required to recreate the crash?

I'm wondering if this is a general problem or something to do with only the XE.

Amigo1 · Post by **Amigo1** » Thu Sep 27, 2012 1:29 am

@ssolie

I think the root cause might be the same about an issue I had few months ago. I had not used my SamFlex for quite some time and the hardware clock on my Sam flex was reset because Of an empty battery. The system was really unstable and kept freezing, so I grabbed my AmigaOS 4.1 update 1 install CD since I feared an Harddrive failure, but I couldn't even go past the Locale settings requester.
I don't remember if I set the clock in UBoot or somehow with the CLI or workbench, but after that, everything behaved correctly again, without the need of a re-install.

Hope this helps narrowing down the cause.

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Iprefs and TimeZone and PlayCD (oh, my!) [SOLVED]

Iprefs and TimeZone and PlayCD (oh, my!) [SOLVED]

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