(not unexpected) Lo-tech XT-CF lite V2 installation issues. Help!

[chris2fett]

After spending some time online in these forums and YouTube, I am not surprised to have some growing pains with installation. Hoping someone here may help me trouble shoot a little, since I am still a newbie at this. I recently purchased a
Lo-tech XT-CF lite V2: having some initial install issues with my new card. Booting my Leading Edge Model D (Phoenix bios v2.13), with 640K, a VGA video card (a JAX-8216A/V1 TRIDENT TVGA9000B VGA card MXB120) and two 5.25 360K FDD installed. When turning on the computer, I get the XT-IDE BIOS info and then the following message:

Master at 300h: not found
Slave at 300h: not found
Booting C>>C
Error 1h!
Booting A>>A

This happens whether there there is a CF card in the slot or not.

I've changed the ISA slot card position, changed J1 (ROM either D800h or C800h) and J2 (IO port 320h or 300h) to see if these would correct the issue. Not sure what to do next. Any advice? I am just trying to get drive C: recognized, so I can then erase the MBR and format the CF card and make it bootable. II heard it's possible that some VGA card can use the 300h address for memory, but I'm not sure if my budget card does or not.

Thanks for your help!

 

[modem7]

Booting my Leading Edge Model D

According to [here], the Leading Edge Technology Model D has a real-time clock (RTC) on the motherboard, at a base I/O port of 300h.
And so that is going to conflict with your XT-CF Lite V2 card if the card is set to 300h.

If you are not concerned about losing the RTC functionality, perhaps there is a way to disable it. Maybe instead, the RTC can be changed to use a different base I/O port.

I've changed the ISA slot card position, changed J1 (ROM either D800h or C800h) and J2 (IO port 320h or 300h) to see if these would correct the issue.

In regard to you changing jumper 2 (base I/O port) on JP1 to the 320h setting, are you aware that a base I/O port change on your card requires two things to be altered:
1. Jumper 2.
2. The XTIDE Universal BIOS (XUB) software in the card's EEPROM be reconfigured to reflect the new base I/O port.

In your case, when step 2 is done, on-screen, the "Master at 300h:" would change to "Master at 320h:"

 

[dhau]

I had similar issues after upgrading from some ancient version xt-ide r560 to latest at the time r608. I had to boot from MS-DOS 5.0 floppy, run fdisk, remove all partitions, then create them again. I also ran fdisk /mbr. After this it worked fine.

 

[chris2fett]

According to [here], the Leading Edge Technology Model D has a real-time clock (RTC) on the motherboard, at a base I/O port of 300h.
And so that is going to conflict with your XT-CF Lite V2 card if the card is set to 300h.

If you are not concerned about losing the RTC functionality, perhaps there is a way to disable it. Maybe instead, the RTC can be changed to use a different base I/O port.


In regard to you changing jumper 2 (base I/O port) on JP1 to the 320h setting, are you aware that a base I/O port change on your card requires two things to be altered:
1. Jumper 2.
2. The XTIDE Universal BIOS (XUB) software in the card's EEPROM be reconfigured to reflect the new base I/O port.

In your case, when step 2 is done, on-screen, the "Master at 300h:" would change to "Master at 320h:"

Thanks for the input.

I would need to figure out how to disable to RTC on a Leading Edge Model D; I believe it's motherboard jumper J13 set to OPEN.

Not sure how to access the built in XUB software to make the change.

Here's the screen I see:

 

[dhau]

XTIDE-CF I have from texelec and bluelava don't work with all CF cards. They work fine with most smaller sized CF cards, for example I use WD SiliconDrive 128MB. But it doesn't work with WD SiliconDrive II 2GB.

Glitchworks XT-IDE r4 works fine with all CF cards.

 

[modem7]

I had similar issues after upgrading from some ancient version xt-ide r560 to latest at the time r608. I had to boot from MS-DOS 5.0 floppy, run fdisk, remove all partitions, then create them again. I also ran fdisk /mbr. After this it worked fine.

I am aware of the issue you encountered, which is due to differences in CHS translation. I have encountered it myself quite a few times. The OP is seeing "not found", which means that the XUB cannot 'see' the CF card. In your situation, the CF would have been found, but a booting problem then resulted due to different translation.

I would need to figure out how to disable to RTC on a Leading Edge Model D; I believe it's motherboard jumper J13 set to OPEN.

And if the hypothesis is correct, then you will see CF model information instead of the "not found" - see [here].
Then I guess you make the call as to whether you 'adjust' the RTC or the XUB.

 

[modem7]

Not sure how to access the built in XUB software to make the change.

An example procedure is at [here]. Because your card has an earlier version of the XUB to that in the procedure, you would use the XTIDECFG.COM for your version of XUB, not the XTIDECFG.COM for version R622.

I do not see your version (contains "2013-10-22") at the 'unofficial' web page at [here]. And if I go to the official download site of [here], the old versions only go back to year 2016. Did the supplier of your card provide any supporting software?

Your version is dated 2013. That is very old, and bugs have been fixed then. And so an alternative thing to do would be to upgrade the XUB to a recent version. An example procedure is at [here].

 

[Malc]

I do not see your version (contains "2013-10-22") at the 'unofficial' web page at [here]. And if I go to the official download site of [here], the old versions only go back to year 2016. Did the supplier of your card provide any supporting software?

It's an old modified version for the XT-CF Lite supplied by Lo-Tech based on r566, And probably still supplied by Texelec.

XT-CF-lite rev.2 - Lo-tech Wiki

www.lo-tech.co.uk

 

[Caluser2000]

I had a similar issue.. I just reducing the speed jumper work on onre of my XT Turbo systems and the hdds and cards fine.

I've mentioned this befow but just got the "upgade to the new XUB" line. I just wanrted to solve the current option on my particuler system

I see no speed problems compared with the old original MFM/RLL setup

 

[modem7]

I do not see your version (contains "2013-10-22") at the 'unofficial' web page at [here]. And if I go to the official download site of [here], the old versions only go back to year 2016. Did the supplier of your card provide any supporting software?

It's an old modified version for the XT-CF Lite supplied by Lo-Tech based on r566, And probably still supplied by Texelec.

XT-CF-lite rev.2 - Lo-tech Wiki

www.lo-tech.co.uk

Than you for the information, and URL.

I have updated my web page at [here], just in case I encounter this modified R566 again. Included is 'Note 2'.

 

[chris2fett]

An example procedure is at [here]. Because your card has an earlier version of the XUB to that in the procedure, you would use the XTIDECFG.COM for your version of XUB, not the XTIDECFG.COM for version R622.

I do not see your version (contains "2013-10-22") at the 'unofficial' web page at [here]. And if I go to the official download site of [here], the old versions only go back to year 2016. Did the supplier of your card provide any supporting software?

Your version is dated 2013. That is very old, and bugs have been fixed then. And so an alternative thing to do would be to upgrade the XUB to a recent version. An example procedure is at [here].

Ah, I see. Well, disabling the RTC by setting motherboard J13 pins 2 and 7 to "OPEN" did not help. Same error message/screen as above.

the ISA card is "new" from Texelec; no additional software was provided. Unfortunately, I have no way to transfer any of these recommended downloaded files to my Leading Edge Model D (that was one of the reasons I needed the compact flash card; for software access and transfers). It's the only machine I have with 5.25 360K drives. There is no 720k or 1.44mb drive in the Leading Edge, so no way to easily copy (downloaded) files from a newer machine to the Leading Edge

 

[dhau]

Unfortunately, I have no way to transfer any of these recommended downloaded files to my Leading Edge Model D (that was one of the reasons I needed the compact flash card

If you feel ambitious, have a COM port on your PC (possibly though a USB to COM adapter), and a null modem cable, you can try to use serdrive.exe that comes with XT IDE BIOS to boot from image of floppy or hard drive served from PC. I did it and it works well.

 

[chris2fett]

If you feel ambitious, have a COM port on your PC (possibly though a USB to COM adapter), and a null modem cable, you can try to use serdrive.exe that comes with XT IDE BIOS to boot from image of floppy or hard drive served from PC. I did it and it works well.

That's a great idea... but beyond what I am capable of at this time.

I will probably have to return the Lo-tech card

I am wondering if it's worth purchasing an XT-IDE rev 4.1 (with XUB 2.0) or if I am just going to run into the same problem(s).

 

[dhau]

You need to be able to book from a floppy. It could be real floppy, gotek, or serdrive, but you got to be able to boot with DOS. If you can't, it's very likely you'll run into same issues with XT-IDE rev 4.1.

Do you have any friends locally with similar hobby? If they have an old PC with ISA bus, ideally XT class, but 286/386/486 will do too. They would be able to help you configure your XT-CF for alternative BIOS start address and/or port and confirm all works on their system and then you can try it again in your PC.

Bluelava seller on ebay sells his XT-CF and XT-IDE bundled with a prepared bootable 64MB CF card. May be you can try that.

 

[chris2fett]

You need to be able to book from a floppy. It could be real floppy, gotek, or serdrive, but you got to be able to boot with DOS. If you can't, it's very likely you'll run into same issues with XT-IDE rev 4.1.

Do you have any friends locally with similar hobby? If they have an old PC with ISA bus, ideally XT class, but 286/386/486 will do too. They would be able to help you configure your XT-CF for alternative BIOS start address and/or port and confirm all works on their system and then you can try it again in your PC.

Bluelava seller on ebay sells his XT-CF and XT-IDE bundled with a prepared bootable 64MB CF card. May be you can try that.

Yes, I can boot from the floppy drive(s) just fine.

I will check the Bluelavla version seller on eBay; I haven't found the specific product you mentioned yet but I will keep looking. Thanks for the heads up!

 

[dhau]

Yes, I can boot from the floppy drive(s) just fine.

I will check the Bluelavla version seller on eBay

If you can boot, no need! Just download recent xt-ide bios from here: https://www.xtideuniversalbios.org/binaries/ - r625 right now. Put xtidecfg.com and ide_xt.bin on your floppy.

Change configuration of your card with jumpers to whatever it needs to be, like 0x320 port and may be 0xd800 address.
Boot from floppy, run xtidecfg.com and configure bios to your port and address. Save it, also flash it. To flash, make sure jumper or switch for flash write protection is is disabled. When flashing, give it the correct start address of flash in hex, or it will fail. There is no auto-detection as far as I know.

Find the smallest CF card you have, like 64 or 256MB. Connect through card reader to your Windows, Mac or Linux PC and remove all partitions. Don't create new partitions on your modern PC.

Boot with CF inserted, it should be detected in XT-IDE boot message. To boot from floppy with CF inserted, press A when XT-IDE BIOS puts its menu on top row of the screen.
Use fdisk /mbr to write DOS boot sector, then run fdisk, create primary partition, all disk, set it as active, reboot.
After reboot, run "format c: /u /s" (assuming MS-DOS 5.0). Remove floppy, reboot, you should hopefully boot from your CF with latest XT-IDE BIOS.

There are some nuances, if you enabled "ChuckG mod" with jumpers on your card, you have to choose XT-IDE v2. If you didn't, use XT-IDE v1. v2 runs at about 500KB/s on a Turbo XT and v1 tops out at about 196KB/s for me. Don't worry about this too much now, get it working with v1, since v2 doesn't work well on some XT clones. You can experiment with v2 later.

Another potential speedup is if you use NEC V20 instead of Intel 8088, you can get a tiny boost by using ide_xtp.bin instead of ide_xt.bin.

 

[chris2fett]

If you can boot, no need! Just download recent xt-ide bios from here: https://www.xtideuniversalbios.org/binaries/ - r625 right now. Put xtidecfg.com and ide_xt.bin on your floppy.

Change configuration of your card with jumpers to whatever it needs to be, like 0x320 port and may be 0xd800 address.
Boot from floppy, run xtidecfg.com and configure bios to your port and address. Save it, also flash it. To flash, make sure jumper or switch for flash write protection is is disabled. When flashing, give it the correct start address of flash in hex, or it will fail. There is no auto-detection as far as I know.

Find the smallest CF card you have, like 64 or 256MB. Connect through card reader to your Windows, Mac or Linux PC and remove all partitions. Don't create new partitions on your modern PC.

Boot with CF inserted, it should be detected in XT-IDE boot message. To boot from floppy with CF inserted, press A when XT-IDE BIOS puts its menu on top row of the screen.
Use fdisk /mbr to write DOS boot sector, then run fdisk, create primary partition, all disk, set it as active, reboot.
After reboot, run "format c: /u /s" (assuming MS-DOS 5.0). Remove floppy, reboot, you should hopefully boot from your CF with latest XT-IDE BIOS.

There are some nuances, if you enabled "ChuckG mod" with jumpers on your card, you have to choose XT-IDE v2. If you didn't, use XT-IDE v1. v2 runs at about 500KB/s on a Turbo XT and v1 tops out at about 196KB/s for me. Don't worry about this too much now, get it working with v1, since v2 doesn't work well on some XT clones. You can experiment with v2 later.

Another potential speedup is if you use NEC V20 instead of Intel 8088, you can get a tiny boost by using ide_xtp.bin instead of ide_xt.bin.

Awesome info! But.... and this is the main issue holding me up from troubleshooting the lo-tech card further... while I can download those files to my modern computer, I have no way to transfer them onto a 5.25 floppy to then use them on the Leading Edge Model D

 

[dhau]

while I can download those files to my modern computer, I have no way to transfer them onto a 5.25 floppy

One way to do it is to buy 5.25" to 3.5" adapter like this: https://shop.bluelavasystems.com/pr...adapter-5-25-to-3-5-floppy-cable-gotek-34-pin
And then you can use 3.5" floppy drive, as long as you cover the hole of 3.5" floppy disk, so it's recognized as DD, not as HD.

Another way, a bit pricier, but also fun, is to buy a modern 8-bit ISA floppy disk adapter like this: https://texelec.com/product/quad-flop-four-port-isa-floppy-controller/
It has it's own BIOS and can work with 3.5 HD floppy drives and disks.

Does Leading Edge have a built-in floppy controller? Can you disable it?

 

[modem7]

And if the hypothesis is correct, then you will see CF model information instead of the "not found" - see [here].
Then I guess you make the call as to whether you 'adjust' the RTC or the XUB.

Well, disabling the RTC by setting motherboard J13 pins 2 and 7 to "OPEN" did not help. Same error message/screen as above.

So, still seeing "not found".

As I see it, the possibilities are:
1. Faulty XT-CF Lite V2 card.
2. The CF card that you are using is faulty.
3. The CF card that you are using is incompatible with the XT-CF Lite V2.
4. An I/O port conflict of some kind.
5. "J13 pins 2 and 7" did not disable the RTC.

Re 1. Unlikely, as surely Texelec (or other) will have tested it. They have a reputation to protect. Still, do you have another computer that you can try the card in?
Re 2. Obviously, it can be checked out on modern hardware.
Re 3. As dhau wrote, try other CF cards.
Re 4. Do you have another computer that you can try the card in?

There are some nuances, if you enabled "ChuckG mod" with jumpers on your card ...

The OP's card is described at [here]. It has no compatibility/hi-speed type switches/jumpers.

 

[seaken]

The Model D will support a 720k 3.5" drive. Do you have any 3.5" drives? Even a 1.44M? (Most 1.44 drives will also behave as a 720K). You could temporarily pull it an attach it to the Model D as Drive A: and boot into DOS from there. (I checked my logs and the Model D will also support the 1.44 Drive and diskettes. So no need to use 720k format).

Or use Laplink to connect to your modern computer? I have done this with Windows 7 and XP.

Borrow a DOS diskette, formatted as 720K or 1.44M, from a friend? Have them put the needed files on the diskette for you?

Seaken