Messages

1

Zaurus - Hardware discussion / Sharp Zaurus SL-C860 not switching on

« on: September 13, 2017, 05:34:32 pm »

Never tried rogue unfortunately. I'm more of a Mame and Doom/Quake guy

Rogue is a classic! Should give it a try.

But MAME is also my love; I've been porting MAME4ALL and XMAME to various handhelds for years - my speciality is high optimization and making things work where previously they did not.
If you have a Dingoo A320/A380, Gemei A330, GCW-Zero, Pandora, GP2X, Wiz or Nanonote I have it already ported!

So what are the major differences between 1000/3000 and 860? Perhaps ALARM will work?  I'd be interested to see what your results would be.

Not much, according to Wikipedia: "(The SL-C3000) featured a similar hardware and software specification to the earlier C860 model; the key differences were that it only had 16 MB of flash memory yet gained an internal 4 GB Hitachi microdrive, a USB Host port, and "lost" the serial port (in some cases the components were not fitted to the motherboard or were incapable of driving the regular serial adaptor cables). The keyboard feel and layout changed somewhat, and most owners preferred it over the 760/860."

So... what's stopping this from working using, say, the SL-C1000's frankenstein kernel?

And one last thing, what's the latest "best" version of pdaXrom for SL-C860?
I've installed - randomly r121 - as I thought it was later than the betas, but I'm suspecting this is an older build.
In which case I should have installed r197, anyway...


Okay I found out that r121 is later than the beta builds.
And that there is pdaXii13 which sits somewhere between the beta builds and the 'r1xx' builds.
pdaXii13 seems to be the way to go? And it does mention support for SL-C860 (corgi/charlie) but only the akita/sally builds seem to be available.
It's all a bit confusing.

I can either stay with r121.
Upgrade to r197.
Or  go with pdaXii13, I think this is the correct install for my SL-C860?
http://members.iinet.net.au/~wyso/myZaurus/pdaXii13/akita/

2

Zaurus - Hardware discussion / Sharp Zaurus SL-C860 not switching on

« on: September 13, 2017, 07:36:53 am »

Actually I gave pdaXrom another go, this time ignoring X.
It's fine just using the CLI. I dont need/want all the other stuff really.

I installed some packages like gcc, binutils, glibc, SDL, make, ncurses and gcc-headers.
Then I compiled up 'rogue' and it runs great of course!
I love rogue - such a great game and it's perfectly well suited for the Z.

So what are the major differences between 1000/3000 and 860? Perhaps ALARM will work?  I'd be interested to see what your results would be.
Thanks for you help!

3

Zaurus - Hardware discussion / Sharp Zaurus SL-C860 not switching on

« on: September 13, 2017, 12:05:34 am »

I have found you can access the SL-C860 Service Menu using the following:

Code: [Select]

1). Unplug power and remove battery, leaving switch in open position.
2). Leave unpowered for about 5 seconds.
3). Hold the Fn + D + M keys all at the same time.
4). Whilst still holding the keys either:
        a). insert a charged battery.
        b). plug in the power cable.
        In either case you don't not need to change the switch position!
5). The service menu should appear almost immediately.
There are many options - including tests, flashing cards, checking the system and various bits of hardware. Nice!

I don't know if I like pdaXrom - doesn't seem to support everything - I'm not sure which is the best distro for the SL-C860.

Pity ALARM doesn't work with it. What's stopping ALARM from working on it anyway?

4

Zaurus - Hardware discussion / Sharp Zaurus SL-C860 not switching on

« on: September 11, 2017, 07:53:38 pm »

This morning I tried again to turn on my SL-C860. I followed your advice and ignored the fact that no LED light switches on.
I tried using the D+M method with and without a battery but was not successful.

However, I tried another method - holding the OK button whilst switching on and this actually succeeded it power on the SL-C860 - it booted into the pdaXrom emergency prompt.
I was quite relieved to see some life as at least that means it's not a hardware related issue.

Thanks for your advice, as it prompted me to give it another go.

So I guess I should try starting the device with a pdaXrom filesystem on the SD card - perhaps that is the only issue?

5

Zaurus - Hardware discussion / Sharp Zaurus SL-C860 not switching on

« on: September 10, 2017, 07:48:05 pm »

Thanks for your reply! And moving to the correct forum.

I don't see the charging LED come on when I plug in the charger. The charger works fine for my other Zaurus (SL-C1000, SL-C3000 and SL-C5600).
I have tried other batteries - all work on my other Zaurus but nothing seems to wake up my SL-C860.

The last thing I did on my SL-860 was leave it on the charger overnight and then flash it with pdaXrom. Once it had finished flashing, I had disconnected it, took the battery out, then tried to switch it back on but it has never turned on since.

Trying the D+M menus seem fruitless as I am never getting the yellow LED coming on in the first place, so I think there is no power getting to the unit.

If the charging fuse is dead inside the Zaurus, would that stop the battery from operating the unit? Should that little yellow LED be lighting up with a battery or is that for charging only?

EDIT:
I found this old thread for the SL-C860:
https://www.oesf.org/forum/index.php?showto...=11539&st=0
Unfortunately none of the attachments or links work re: photos for locating the fuses.
Also the thread mentions using 0603 sized fuses in 630mA and 2000mA varieties. Both of these seem hard to get in low quantities.

Also found the following internal pics of SL-C3200:
http://www.penguin.cz/~utx/zaurus/teardown
Was thinking could spot the fuses near the power input to get an idea what to look for. But can't really identify them.

6

Zaurus - Hardware discussion / Sharp Zaurus SL-C860 not switching on

« on: September 08, 2017, 05:42:36 am »

Whilst messing around with ALARM for Sharp Zaurus on SL-C1000 abd SL-C3000, I tried flashing my SL-C860 (not with ALARM but pdaXrom) but after flashing, it seems to be dead.

It just won't turn on and the power light no longer comes on when I plug it in to a power supply.

I've tried booting whilst holding On and D+B and D+M but I'm not getting anything at all.

I know it's not directly related to ALARM (sorry!) but I was hoping someone could help me out with some advice?

7

Zaurus - Arch Linux ARM support / Update: C1000 / Akita support

« on: August 18, 2017, 07:25:23 am »

Seems that guide is old as some of the directories and files references don't exist on my filesystem.

Also starting with the usb cable plugged in to my computer results in a hang at boot time:

[ Ok ] Started udev Coldplug all Devices.

This is the last line of the boot sequence and it just sits there forever.

8

Zaurus - Arch Linux ARM support / Update: C1000 / Akita support

« on: August 17, 2017, 01:06:25 am »

Thanks, I will review this with the next kernel build. If it is too much of an issue, please use 4.9-rc3 in the meantime.

It's no big deal at the moment.

I'd like to start my project but the real blocker for me is that I can't get USB ethernet working.

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Zaurus - Arch Linux ARM support / Update: C1000 / Akita support

« on: August 15, 2017, 06:02:39 am »

I noticed that too, I think this was introduced in the 4.12-rc1 kernel. Can you confirm that is the kernel you booted ? If yes, try the version below 4.9-rc3.

Just found a problem on the SL-C1000:

Some of capital letters only work with either the left or right shift key but not both.
ie. to get 'A' I have to use the right hand side 'shift' key. ie <rshift>+a, <lshift>+a doesn't work.

Capital 'S' is the opposite: I can only type it with the left 'shift' key. ie <lshift>+s, <rshift>+s doesn't work.

Caps lock always works.

Probably GPIO misconfiguration (assuming the keyboard is GPIO driven?).

I can confirm it's the  4.12.0-rc1 kernel.

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Zaurus - Arch Linux ARM support / Alarmz On Sl-c1000

« on: August 14, 2017, 10:19:07 pm »

Hi Varti,

How long did you wait while the OE logo was displayed ?
Kexecboot is possibly parsing your NAND or has trouble doing so.

When I start my SL-C1000, I have to wait a minute or so before the Arch Linux boot menu appears.

11

Zaurus - Hardware discussion / What Was Your Favorite Zaurus Line

« on: August 14, 2017, 07:48:14 pm »

Back when I had a Palm PDA, I would have loved to have an SL-5600 instead! I never realized they even existed! Pity!

But now, my preference is the SL-C1000 style - even though I have an SL-C860 as well.

I like the idea the 860 has a graphics chip - how much support is there for it, in say SDL?

What kind of capabilities does the 1000/3000 have in terms of graphics? Are they simple framebuffers?
Do they have "lo-res" modes ie. 320x240 or are they purely 640x480 framebuffers (or 480x640 if rotated in memory).

12

Zaurus - Arch Linux ARM support / Update: C1000 / Akita support

« on: August 13, 2017, 10:33:01 pm »

Just found a problem on the SL-C1000:

Some of capital letters only work with either the left or right shift key but not both.
ie. to get 'A' I have to use the right hand side 'shift' key. ie <rshift>+a, <lshift>+a doesn't work.

Capital 'S' is the opposite: I can only type it with the left 'shift' key. ie <lshift>+s, <rshift>+s doesn't work.

Caps lock always works.

Probably GPIO misconfiguration (assuming the keyboard is GPIO driven?).

13

Zaurus - pdaXrom / New Pdaxrom Development

« on: August 13, 2017, 07:45:10 pm »

I still have various Zaurus  SL-C3000, SL-C1000, SL-C860 and an SL-C5600.

I tried all the distros and found pdaXrom was the best of the lot except that it didn't suspend power - unless I was doing something wrong*.
It would run through the battery very quickly!

If this one thing was fixed I would use it again.

At the moment I'm experimenting with Arch Linux.


*I have since found that 'apm --suspend' seems to do the job, using r121 build on my SL-C860.

14

Zaurus - Arch Linux ARM support / Update: C1000 / Akita support

« on: August 13, 2017, 05:09:47 pm »

Is there anything you want me to test out or try?

If you have a Wifi card (CF or USB), it would be interesting to check if it works, especially on an SL-C1000.

Varti

I only have a WiFi SD card but of course this won't work.

I would be happy and actually prefer USB networking.

Start g_ether automatically (does it do this by default?)

Code: [Select]

echo g_ether > /etc/modules-load.d/g_ether.confCreate a usb0 device for netctl:

Code: [Select]

vim /etc/netctl/usb0

Connection=ethernet
Description='Connection via USB'
Interface=usb0
IP=static
Address=('192.168.7.2/30')

Auto start on boot:

Code: [Select]

netctl enable usb0Start it:

Code: [Select]

ifconfig usb0 up
Doesn't seem to do anything on my Win7 box - but will try on my Mac OS X box later.

Should USB networking work?

15

Zaurus - Arch Linux ARM support / Update: C1000 / Akita support

« on: August 13, 2017, 07:49:14 am »

Okay I have installed ALARM on both an SL-C1000 and SL-C3000.
The minimal installs on both look great so far - I haven't had a chance to do much else.
I get the GPIO207 issue as above re: backlight_on.

Is there anything you want me to test out or try?
I'm only using an EXT3 FS.

So far so good! Thanks for your efforts with this.