A5000 alpha with 8Mb RAM (Atomwide fitted), FPA11, Cumana SCSI card but no devices attached, ColourCard running mode 103 (800x600x256 @ ~72Hz) to an Iiyama VisionMaster 9217, 420Mb IDE drive. Not much used lately (1-2 per week for short sessions).

Condensing the story so far:

Mid-session the other day the screen went blank and stayed blank through a reset. I switched off and back on, but got no signal to the monitor and the following pattern in the POST flashes (0=short, 1=long):

0000
0000
0000
0000
1100
0000
0101
1001

From a couple of FAQ items explaining POSTs, I think this means video (Virq) and sound (Sirq) failures (which fits with the dead screen and - which I had noticed at first - lack of a beep on booting).

I had to run through this a couple of times to get the sequence, and noticed that other things were not quite right. At first, after the POST the boot would continue and I could get some response from the hard disc/floppy while running "blind" (F12, *. would cause the relevant light to flash, and *shutdown or shift-control-F12 would get a dismounting blink from the HD). I have taken out the ColourCard and SCSI card, tried a different monitor and used delete-power on to reset the configuration. Now nothing seems to respond except reset and control-break.

My main concerns now are:

1. if RISCOS should be booting to desktop after the POST (default language 10 ?), why doesn't F12, *mount 4, *. get any response from the HD? Is the poor machine dying by degrees?

2. is the POST trying to tell me something else is bust besides the video and sound?

3. if this has happened to anyone else, how much did it cost to fix and does anyone know if the parts are still available?

Many thank in advance,
Andrew

While you've got the lid off, try pulling all the other hardware off it to see if you can get it to boot properly. I'm not sure if machines are meant to carry on booting after a POST failure, but that's probably not important.

If the VIDC is socketed you can probably still get replacements for it. I couldn't see one on CJE's online price list but that doesn't mean they're not in stock.

I'm still curious as to what happened (and whether it will happen again!).