Minerva4Q68 SD Card Setup

[dilwyn]

Mine says ROM Loader v1.05 as it starts. SMSQ/E v3.38.

Would it be possible for you to send a zip or image of your working Minerva4Q68, Derek? (Q68_ROM.SYS or _rext versions - either via here or to me by email) Then we could eliminate errors on my part in setting it up.

[Derek_Stewart]

Hi Dilwyn,

I will see what I can do.

I did not do anythi g special, just create a FAT32 partion on a new SD Card, copy the Q68_UKROM.SYS to the FAT32 partition as Q68_ROM.SYS and a Qubide file from QL-SD v1

I also noticed that I did not have mouse connected to the PS/2 Splitter, maybe you could try disconnect the mouse and leave the keyboard connected.

[janbredenbeek]

Hi Dilwyn,

Would it be possible for you to send a zip or image of your working Minerva4Q68, Derek? (Q68_ROM.SYS or _rext versions - either via here or to me by email) Then we could eliminate errors on my part in setting it up.

Here is a link to the 96K image of my stable branch: https://github.com/janbredenbeek/Minerv ... _USROM.SYS
This is the earlier version which has the SD card driver in the $10000-$18000 area so no room for other extension ROMs. The actual keyboard handler hasn't changed since, only the setup code is different. But it might be useful to see if the newer version has bugs or maybe the image was corrupted. (from Derek's photo I gather that he's still using this version).

[dilwyn]

Hi Dilwyn,

Would it be possible for you to send a zip or image of your working Minerva4Q68, Derek? (Q68_ROM.SYS or _rext versions - either via here or to me by email) Then we could eliminate errors on my part in setting it up.

Here is a link to the 96K image of my stable branch: https://github.com/janbredenbeek/Minerv ... _USROM.SYS
This is the earlier version which has the SD card driver in the $10000-$18000 area so no room for other extension ROMs. The actual keyboard handler hasn't changed since, only the setup code is different. But it might be useful to see if the newer version has bugs or maybe the image was corrupted. (from Derek's photo I gather that he's still using this version).

Thanks Jan, but still no joy. Here's a photo of where that version gets to:

Minerva4Q68

Out of interest, just in case I happened to be using a duff SD-card, I reformatted it and put Q68_SMSQ on it. That started up fine. So I reformatted it again and retried the 96K version, which continued to fail.

Out of interest, the cards I've been using are all rated C10 speed, a mix of Verbatim, Sandisk, Kingston and unbranded. They are a variety of capacities from 8GB up to 64GB. One is class U3 C10. All start up fine with SMSQ/E, none start with Minerva either as Q68_ROM.sys or _rext installed from SMSQ/E.

[janbredenbeek]

Hi Dilwyn,

Thanks Jan, but still no joy. Here's a photo of where that version gets to:

Not sure if you are using a mouse, but Minerva currently doesn't support mice. It does emulate the keyboard controls for PE programs though.
Connecting a mouse to the PS/2 port will certainly cause Minerva to crash as it currently has no interrupt handler for this. Also, the Q68 doesn't exactly emulate the BBQL's interrupt register as Minerva expects, so Minerva's interrupt handler has to be changed by backporting the code from SMSQ/E.

I will have a look at this in the coming weeks if I have time...

[dilwyn]

Derek recently mentioned that Minerva on his system worked fine, but that he only used a keyboard. I can confirm that even without a mouse connected (keyboard connected direct to Q68 without splitter cable) mine never even gets as far as being able to press F1 or F2 to start Minerva.
(Not able to use a computer much at the moment as this village is back in and out of bloody power cuts again, so typing this hastily while we actually have power.)
At least the crashes are more colourful without a mouse
[attachment=0]q68-6.jpg[/attachmennt]

[Derek_Stewart]

Hi,

I copied the file Q68_UKROM.SYS as Q68ROM.SYS to the FAT32 partition of an SD Card on a Q68 with v1.05 FPGA code.

On power up Minerva started to the F1/F2 prompt, I switched the Q68 off and on 3 thrre times all worked.

I notedthat Minerva had read the WIN1 QWA file: QLWA.WIN, as defined in the Minerva config blocks, so I add some statements not to load SMSQ/E commands in Minerva. Saved the boot file and pressed thd power Off/On, but only got the black screen with red Minerva logo.

On a QL, this screen would indicate the 8049 not working.

Taliking to Jan on the QL Chat, he indicated that his Q68 has FPGA code v1.00

So I could reprogram a Q68 with the same FPGA code and see if thst makes a difference.

[janbredenbeek]

I was able to crash Minerva by connecting a PS/2 mouse and moving it, thereby generating an external interrupt (which Minerva cannot process because the Q68 doesn't set bit 4 of the PC.INTR register, hence it will not execute the list of handlers). This was an old wireless Logitech mouse, connected via a converter. Interestingly, connecting a Dell optical mouse will stop my Q68 from booting beyond the initial RAM test, where it booted fine with the Logitech mouse (both connected via a USB to PS/2 converter).

The Minerva interrupt handler can be easily changed to make it respond to the external interrupt (and in the process remove redundant code for BBQL hardware not applicable to the Q68).

[janbredenbeek]

I can confirm that even without a mouse connected (keyboard connected direct to Q68 without splitter cable) mine never even gets as far as being able to press F1 or F2 to start Minerva.

* UPDATE *: I have uploaded a patched version of Minerva4Q68 which should fix the interrupt problems; the mouse and Ethernet interrupt is now disabled on startup and an external interrupt handler added for the keyboard. Can you please try out this one?

This is a US keyboard version with TKII included so 96K. You may have to rename the unzipped file to Q68_ROM.SYS as zip/unzip seems to have its own opinion about how file extensions should be written. Alternatively, you can use Min4Q68ldr to load it from SMSQ/E.

Link to the ZIP file: https://files.bredenbeek.net/s/D8EC6PZ8PABnuR8c

[dilwyn]

I can confirm that even without a mouse connected (keyboard connected direct to Q68 without splitter cable) mine never even gets as far as being able to press F1 or F2 to start Minerva.

* UPDATE *: I have uploaded a patched version of Minerva4Q68 which should fix the interrupt problems; the mouse and Ethernet interrupt is now disabled on startup and an external interrupt handler added for the keyboard. Can you please try out this one?

This is a US keyboard version with TKII included so 96K. You may have to rename the unzipped file to Q68_ROM.SYS as zip/unzip seems to have its own opinion about how file extensions should be written. Alternatively, you can use Min4Q68ldr to load it from SMSQ/E.

Link to the ZIP file: https://files.bredenbeek.net/s/D8EC6PZ8PABnuR8c

As Q68_ROM.SYS it gets as far as the Minerva text in the picture below.

As a ldr/rext file LRESPRed from SMSQ/E it only gets as far as drawing the Minerva logo, no other text (in case the relative timings give you a clue).

In both cases, as before, after about 30 seconds (varies) it disappears off into a random technicolour crash screen.

Interim Min4Q68