Path: chuka.playstation.co.uk!scea!greg_labrec@interactive.sony.com
From: tim@metalithic.com (Tim Otholt)
Newsgroups: scea.yaroze.problems.pc
Subject: SIOCONS Problems (Advanced Troubleshooting?)
Date: Thu, 10 Jul 1997 00:48:11 GMT
Organization: SCEA Net Yaroze News
Lines: 89
Message-ID: <5q1bhe$n4n1@scea>
NNTP-Posting-Host: timPC.metalithic.com
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Hi Mario,

I am having problems with SIOCONS.  But the problems I am experiencing
is not the typical "newbie" problems, but it "appears" to be a real
glitch of some sort.  Let me explain my configuration, and maybe you
can help me out.

Intel Penium Triton motherboard, with Windows 95, 40MB RAM, 2 COM
ports, bleh, bleh bleh.  COM ports on the Triton motherboard, if I'm
not mistaken, emulate 16550AFs, not the older 8250s.  COM1 and COM2.

Hardware setup:

Microsoft Serial Mouse on COM1
Net Yaroze on COM2, via a 9 -> 25 pin connector

No other COM devices, NO COM3 or COM4, NO I/O conflicts, no IRQ
conflicts.  (I wrote a DOS PnP card isolator and resource arbitrator,
so I do understand that I'm not having a problem here.  No BIOS
conflict problems, no PCI conflict problems, yea, the hardware has
always worked for me, bleh, bleh, bleh...)

The Codewarrior 2.0 PSComUtil *AND* the Codewarrior debugger works
just dandy.  No problems downloading executibles, data, .TIM files,
etc, etc.  Debugger single steps through programs just fine.  Yaroze
works good enough.

But then comes SIOCONS and GDB.  Bleh.

Here's my detailed explanation of my setup:

1. Quit all Windows COM applications (such as PsComUtil, Codewarrior
Debugger, etc, etc).  Open a MS-DOS box under Win95.

2. Set DOS environment variable for GDB and SIOCONS to use I/O 2F8,
IRQ 3, 9600.  No typos, just like the manual says it.

3. Net Yaroze is reset, then "booted", with no memory card (so serial
I/O speed is 9600).  It is in "wait" mode, looking for a PC
connection.

4. Start up SIOCONS, with baudrate set to 9600 (-b9600)

5. Start downloading a program

6. Playstation recognizes the connection, and it displays the usual
message about 9600 baud, and that things should be working fine.

7. But in the Windows 95 DOS box, the "usual" SIOCON messages that I'm
supposed to get don't show up.  In fact, SIOCONS hangs up in some very
weird way. But I can quit SIOCONS back to my DOS prompt.  Wait 15
minutes, still no messages.

8. So I try this OUTSIDE of Windows 95.  Full Win95 shutdown, power
off reset, boot Win95 command prompt only, and try it again.  No
luck.  Even with the environment variable set, SIOCONS is still acting
weird.

So is anyone having problems with Intel Triton motherboards, 16550AF
serial ports, or anything else like this?  Is there a need to
"pre-set" the COM ports to 8,N,1 using the DOS MODE utility, or
something like that?  I assume SIOCONS and GDB properly set the serial
port to 8,N,1 before attempting any communications with the Yaroze.

I guess it's not that big of a deal, since I can use Codewarrior, but
I have no love for the Codewarrior tools.  I can remember those old
glory days of the command line compiler, and I reminess of that old
Microsoft debugger Codeview 2.0.

Aloha

Tim Otholt
tim@metalithic.com


===================================================

Tim Otholt
tim@metalithic.foo
http://www.nanospace.com/~yukari/
San Francisco, CA

Due to the large increase in robot junk mail in my
email inbox, my email address is listed with the
domain metalithic.foo.  Change the "foo" to "com"
to send me email.

===================================================