How do I blow a driver??

[ian823478]

Minor correction - desktop is 984MHz with 1GB RAM
Ian

[JAZZCNC]

Bios needs to be set to ECP. . . Also are there any settings in the bios for any type of power managment on the fly CPU clock frequency changing type settings, will say something like EIST or C1E.? If so then disable them. 99% sure this isn't your problem now but it would be when you did get it sorted because Mach doesnt like the CPU being messed with while working.!!

Would completly eliminate the PC by try connecting to another (But not Laptop).
Also forgot to mention make sure the PC doesn't have Apple Quicktime or any Adobe products installed. Turn of any power management, screen savers etc and auto updates.

Few only took 30mins and 6 attempts to write that so must be better now, think I'll try and finish that welding now.

[ian823478]

Hi Dean
BIOS set back to ECP.
Board winging its way back to Roy (now I know why it's called a mother....board)
Tune in next week for the next exciting episode!
Ian

[Jonathan]

Minor correction - desktop is 984MHz with 1GB RAM
Ian

984MHz sounds very limited for mach3. I used to use a 1.4GHz AMD for the CNC computer. It appeared to run just fine on 25KHz kernel frequency, but I found when I switched to the 3GHz P4 I could get much higher step frequencies (i.e. feedrates) with the same kernel frequency.

[ian823478]

Hi Jonathan - you may be right, although on the Artsoft website they quote 1GHz and 512MB RAM. As a hobbyist with limited funds, I'm not too worried about speed at the moment, but if the machine is a potential source of problems then I'll need to look at it.

I'm still confused by the result of the Artsoft drivertest program and the Mach3 diagnostic page - as I said in an earlier post:
"The drivertest program shows a message 'pulsing too fast' but the pulses per sec show as about 15000 to 17000 where I believe 25000 is required, BUT in Mach3 diagnostics page pulses is always within 10 of 25000. These seem to be contradicting messages?"
Can anyone enlighten me?

Cheers
Ian

[ian823478]

Just to update anyone interested:
Roy has tested the boards and says they are fine. He is making some more on Monday and will send me a new motherboard, but if the old one was OK I'm not very hopeful that will help. I did find a thread on here from routercnc in 2010 where he had some problems with a system3 setup that he traced to the power supply. Apparently that was missed steps rather than unrequested moves so may not be related.
Anyway I have asked Roy if he will send a new PSU when he returns the card as it seems to be the only bit that hasn't been swapped/eliminated.
Fingers crossed!