Machsupport Forum
Mach Discussion => General Mach Discussion => Topic started by: Otokoyama on March 12, 2006, 07:30:09 PM
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I had Mach3 Turn running quite well last weekend, but the motherboard on that machine fried.
I got a new motherboard, processor, memory, hard drive, and got Windows XP Professional, just to make sure that the Windows XP Professional System Optimization Guide was 100% relevant.
I have gone through the Optimization Guide and did everything suggested, except for one thing. On Step 9, when I tried to Update Driver on Computer to Standard PC, the DriverTest would not run. Changing the driver back to Uniprocessor PC allows DriverTest to run to completion. I had in Step 0 disabled ACPI in the BIOS Power Management Setup, so this shouldn't matter.
When I connect up to the lathe, velocity values that previously were fine now result in motor stalling. I used to get 1450, now I can't get 1000. I have tried both 25000 and 35000 kernal speeds, and there doesn't seem to be a difference except what the motor tuning dialog reports as the possible maximum.
When I slow the motor way down just to get it to work, the axes move, but I can hear a thudding on both axes that occurs roughly 3 times per second. The frequency of the thudding noise does not change when I change the motor speed.
I am using Version 1.90.017.
Any advice on how to debug this would be appreciated. Thanks.
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Just as a quick test please try running in Sherline mode..
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Assuming I didn't need to reboot or restart, there is no difference.
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I think you need to restart... But I could be wrong...
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I set the Sherline 1/2 pulse mode, applied, okayed, reset, shut down, and restarted Mach3. There's doesn't appear to be any difference.
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Art should be back at it tomorrow :) I will tell him that we need to have his help.
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Thanks. I'll really appreciate the help!
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Hi Guys:
I suspect your timing is not good. Run the drivertest.exe. Are you sure its showing a line with no hugh spikes of timeing variation??
Thnaks
ARt
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I ran DriverTest and waited for a particularly bad spike, then grabbed the screen. This is what I got (except that the original Timer Variations frame was gray, not pinkish):
(http://home1.gte.net/res0d176/MachTestResults.gif)
It's usually quite flat with little variation, more like this:
(http://home1.gte.net/res0d176/MachTestResults2.gif)
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As best I can tell, there's not much else going on:
(http://home1.gte.net/res0d176/Processes.gif)
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Hi:
That "Bad" screen is fine. This is a very good result. Dont worry further about the state of the computer as far as the driver is concerned.
Looks like we're not going to see the "Cluynk" time on the drivertest. That small dip would not be heard. One of the funny things about all this stuff, is if the
CPU is getting shut down intermittantly, you may not see the time spike. If you command a long move on only the X axis, how often does it thunk..?
Art
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I had Mach 2 running, although the driver test was very spikey, and then I tried to install Mach3. Again I had to manually install the driver, and the program comes up and runs, but driver test does nothing. When I try to run it it just literally does nothing at all. I know that the Mach3 driver is running because it stops my screen saver. What could cause the driver test to not respond?
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You didn't uncheck the "install Driver" on install did you???
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No, I dont think so. I had to manually install the driver for mach2 also. When I run Mach3 the status bar says "driver succesfully loaded" so I'm pretty sure it running, it seams like its just the driver test program that doesent run
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I think you may have to run the apic driver... I have never had to use it so I will have Art take a look at this ???
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Hi:
No..Apic wont help here. This is a process lockup, Hard to say why, but something on that system doesnt like Mach at all.
I suspect it woudl take a reload of Windows to see whats going on. I think Id start by removeing it all and trying again. You say you had
to load the driver manually. Why, what error did you get, or was there no error, just no driver?
Art
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No error, I just assumed it didnt load right because Mach2 had done a similar thing. That is, the drivertest would not run, but after I manualy loaded the driver, Mach2 driver test ran OK. Ive never gotten any errors or had any problems running Mach2 or Mach3. It appears to be running fine, except for the driver test. Should I check for activity at LPT1?
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Sure. Why not, it may even work anyway...
Art
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Hmmm...,I dont know,I plugged a machine up,no movement...log shows driver being initialized, cant get motor tuning screen to come up,I'lll check outputs with a DVM and post after I poke around some more. At this point it doesent seem to be driving LPT1 but I need to verify that..............
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Well it is aparent that Mach3 is not running. So I decided to go back to where I was, and load Mach2 back up (I wish I had never deleted it). Only problem is that now I cant run the installation file. It says that it is "not a valid 32 bit application" or something. In the manual it says that the .xml file or files must be deleted, how or where do I find these?
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The XML's are in the Mach2/3 Dir
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Something is wrong, I just wish I new what it was. I deleted everythinjg I could find related to Mach2 but still cant reload it. When I try to download it gives me some kind of path error, "access to file, path or device denied". I geusse the only thing left to do is a fresh windows start. Whaty trips me out is that
I bought this particular computer because someone else said they had Mach2 running great on it. It must be something in the way Windows is set up.
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If I try to run the Mach2 download, now it says it is "not a valid Win32 file". Any clue as to why I cant run the download file now?
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Before you format and clean install the OS it might be worth doing a repair. The repair will take almost as long as a new install so if you dont have anything on the computer that you really need the format may be the best way to go.
Then again if the driver test is very spiky then it may be better to get another comuter. One that I had was bad on the drive test and optimising did help but I figured that if I had to go through the optimisation to get it to work properly then I felt it was not a stable enough platform for me to run my mill with (just my opinion)
Hood
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I just ordered a new refurbished desktop, HP Vectra 1GHZ, 128RAM, Windows 2K, 20GB HD. For 100 bucks its worth it, if it works anyway. It should be a clean install of Windows, with nothing else on it.
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Allright, I am typing this from my new HP Vectra 1GHZ 128MB P3 after installing and sucesfully running Mach3. The driver test looks great, everything went without a hitch. I'm gonna unplug this from the web and into my controller (probably tomorrow) and hopefully start controlling my mill with it. Will post results (Im sure it will be fine) within a couple of days.
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Halfnutz, thats the exact computer I use on my machine, but with 256k memory.
Its works file for me, so I suspect you will have joy.
128k is very low memory, even for just booting windows in, your virtual memory ( hard drive) will be working overtime.
It hurts paying heaps for PC ram even though DDR Ram is a fraction of the price. Anyhow see how you go.
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Ynneb, I dont mind buying some RAM, but I want to get it running first. I hooked my router up yesterday, but cant get any output from the computer. I dont know whats up, but my com port doesent seem to be doing anything. I'll have to go through the configuration step by step and figure it out, but I would think it should work without making any changes, since my router is basic step/dir. control. I know the wiring and controller are good 'cause I unplugged it from a working set-up of TurboCNC. Maybe its the logic low? But that should just change direction I think.......
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Allright! Its up and running, I was going nuts, I forgot to set the port number for the step and direction outputs. So now its time to tune.....
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Now that Ive tuned up and played around I am really impressed with Mach3. I wish I would have done this long ago. The wizards are awesome. They do in minutes what I sometimes struggle with for hours with other cad/cam software.
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Good we like to see people happy ;D