H20T43-SRV400 controller card differences

Just got this controller card in the hopes of replacing one of the chips to activate 4th axis capability.

I found some differences however.

1)The axis chips have different numbers on my old card as compared to the new one.

Is this going to cause problems when I try to activate the 4th axis socket?

2)My old card has a wire jumped in the empty socket. I wonder why?

3) There is an additional jumper on the new card labeled F1-F3. My old card doesn't have this.

The function of this jumper is not identified in the manual because as can be seen in my old card, it doesn't exist. The pin placement is there, but there are no pins so there's really no place for a jumper unless you soldered it in.

I was wondering what this (additional) jumper was for?

Thanks,
Alex

Here's the pictures.
I'm getting ready to test the new card now just to see if it functions ok. Obviously I won't be pulling any chips yet. I still need a power cable to run a test on the 4th motor.
Alex

Match the red jumpers.

Pull the white jumper out.

The different numbers on the chips are not a problem.

Eric

Quote:

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Originally Posted by ericscottf

Match the red jumpers.

Pull the white jumper out.

The different numbers on the chips are not a problem.

Eric

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Thanks Eric.
I did notice that they are the same chips but only had a few different numbers on them which probably just indicate a different date of manufacture.

Do you know why the white jumper was there in the first place? I wonder if it had anything to do with the F1-F3 jumper not being available on that older card.

BTW I dug out a p3 500 mhz machine (which is significantly faster than the usual 486) to test my new ISA card. Success! It works. One thing I noticed is that with the older 486 pc, the z dropped about a 1/16" between firing up the controller program and closing it as the brake disengages and rengages.

Although I haven't put a indicator on it yet, With the p3 computer it doesn't seem to drop at all. It's quite noticeable even without an indicator when using the older pc, about a 1/16". This is probably due to the fact that it takes a bit longer to fire the program on the 486. It gives a distinctive buhleep when the program finally comes online during which the brake is then disengaged, whereas with the P3 500mhz pc the program fires almost instantly giving up just a quick beep. Anyway I couldn't feel any movement on the Z starting and stopping the program on the newer pc. But I did get a readout of about 0.006" on the d
DRO. I'll have to check that with an indicator. It's not a big deal, just a curiosity.

But suffice to say, both cards work in the newer pc.

For those of you who plan on using an older ISA card such as mine here's a little tip:

Install the g code program first. Check to see what irq and memory address is available on your computer. Then fire up the g code controller program and hit shift f10. Set the memory address and irq in the program. Then set the memory address dip switches and irq jumper on the card the same, before you put it in. Then put it in and make the appropriate connection to the amplifier box.

It's important to do it in this order for the older GCODE VER.105c program and the older SRV400 ISA card. I have used this running dos,95,and now successfully tested with 98. Mostly I've used it straight out of the 95 window on a 486 pc. I've never had a problem with that setup. Only once did it slow the machine down a bit because I ran a very long program and I think the computer just couldn't keep up. So I paused it for a moment to let it catch up and was back up and running about 120 ipm or so. That's really the only hiccup I ever had. When it couldn't keep up (because the program was so long) the feed rate dropped to about 30 ipm or so.

But that's really the only problem I've ever had aside from the usual frustrations having to do with the limitations of this older style setup. There's plenty of ways to work around these and generally speaking, I'm a pretty happy camper. What I see in the preview is what I get at the machine and it's never failed.

Things are going to change soon because I can already see that 4 axis moves don't preview quite the same way. I'll have to be real careful with that.

But so far so good. The next step will be to slap that extra 4th amp in and test that. I'll need a power cable to do the test. So right now I'm just messing with the newer pc getting that ready. It's got a way better video card in it which I think is appropriate for this application. It's an old 3d labs oxygen card that I used to use for programming on a separate pc. It worked pretty good even for older games and cad/cam but I finally upgraded to a newer nvidia card for my graphics and games. Anyway it's just fine for running the gcode program and then some. This thing doesn't even have a fan! But it's really not that bad and I'm glad to finally find a good place for it.