[ale] Zapmedia Zapstation

Mon Aug 27 11:47:37 EDT 2007

Hi y'all.  Thanks, Aaron, for cluing me in to this thread.

Jim is right about the three stages.  But what he has forgotten or
maybe didn't know is that if you have an original zapstation, there
are a reasonable number of security measure in it.  For starters, the
BIOS won't boot anything but one of the original locking hard drives.
If the drive is unlocked it will attempt to lock it and reboot.  If
you don't have that drive it isn't going to boot.  If you do, then it
should boot.

It will not boot off a CD.  The BIOS has that turned off.

If you can find an updated BIOS online and can burn it onto a BIOS
chip, then you should be able to treat the ZS like any other computer.

You might like to join the zapstation yahoo group.  It is pretty
quiet, but there are a fair number of the original developers on it,
as well as some guys who have tried to turn it into a media PC.

Michael

On 8/26/07, James P. Kinney III <jkinney at localnetsolutions.com> wrote:
> Having a neuron fire on this (It's been 6 years or so), stage 1 was
> bios, stage 2 was core OS and stage 3 was application launching. If your
> system is not getting past stage on, the board is likely bad. As the
> board is a standard size (I think), you should be able to swap it out
> for a working board. Back panel will be an issue as well as the front
> LCD (the original was serial line stuff and very specific to the board
> and the LCD panel itself. I didn't work at all on the LCD panel so I
> have no info at all on it.).
>
> On Sun, 2007-08-26 at 02:22 -0400, Jay Finch wrote:
> > I actually was one of the QA Testers for the Zapstation back in the
> > day (before I was laid off) - I seem to recall a bug in the kernel
> > loading process, but I am dredging my memory and not coming up with
> > more than that.
> >
> > Michael Hirsch & James would really be your best resources on this,
> > sadly.  I wish I could contribute more, but alas that was many years
> > (and 2 jobs) ago.
> >
> > Sorry, and best of luck!  I loved the Zapstation and only wish I could
> > have gotten one of my own when I was laid off -- It was a great
> > device, imnsho. :)
> >
> > Cheers!
> > Jay
> >
> > aaron wrote:
> > > I believe Michael Hirsch still lurks on the list; I've CC'd this
> > > to the last known good address I had for him as well.
> > >
> > > Like James Kinney, he worked on code for the product. I know
> > > he was actively trying to get the code released as full OSS as
> > > recently as 2 years ago. He may be able to offer some advice
> > > if this hits his radar.
> > >
> > > peace
> > > aaron
> > >
> > > On Friday 24 August 2007 20:00, Brian Pitts wrote:
> > >
> > > > James P. Kinney III wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > Dead and gone with the dot com busts. If you hang a CD off the internal
> > > > > IDE connector you should be able to boot and load an OS (Linux only -
> > > > > please :)
> > > > >
> > > > It has two ide channels, one with a black connector and one with a blue
> > > > connector. When I got it, the hard drive was connected to the blue
> > > > connector and the dvd drive was connected to the black connector. I
> > > > placed an Ubuntu 6.06 cd in the dvd drive and got the the three
> > > > behaviors listed below.
> > > >
> > > > 1) The monitor displays "Loading stage 1 of 3" and the lcd displays
> > > > "please wait starting up." The box then restarts and this happens again.
> > > > After the second time, the monitor goes black except for a flashing
> > > > cursor in the lower left. This occurs with if the hard drive is
> > > > connected to the blue ide channel, i.e.
> > > >
> > > > a) blue: hdd, black: dvd
> > > > b) blue: hdd, black: n/a
> > > >
> > > > 2) The monitor displays "Loading stage 1 of 3" and the lcd displays
> > > > "please wait starting up." The box then restarts and this happens again,
> > > > and again, and again, etc. This occurs if nothing is connected to the
> > > > blue ide channel, i.e.
> > > >
> > > > c) blue: n/a, black: dvd
> > > > d) blue: n/a, black: hdd
> > > > e) blue: n/a, black: n/a
> > > >
> > > > 3) The monitor displays "Loading stage 1 of 3" and the lcd displays
> > > > "please wait starting up." The lcd then displays "power down your
> > > > zapstation" and the monitor displays a blinking cursor in the upper
> > > > left. This occurs if the dvd drive is connected to the blue ide channel,
> > > > i.e.
> > > >
> > > > f) blue: dvd, black:hdd
> > > > g) blue: dvd, black n/a
> > > >
> > > > Behavior #3 doesn't change if the drive is empty or has a different
> > > > bootable cd. I've also tried booting from usb with no luck.
> > > >
> > > > I suppose my next step is to pull the drives out and test them in
> > > > another system. Also, I'm worried that it might not recognize my usb
> > > > keyboard, making my hit random keys and hope for BIOS setup attempts
> > > > worthless, but since there are no ps/2 ports...
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > > and make a multi-media box yourself with some MP3 jukebox code
> > > > > from freshmeat.
> > > > >
> > > > That's my thought as well. If nothing else, I'm glad to have the case to
> > > > stick another mini/micro motherboard in.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > > The built-in modem is/was a cheap hunk of crap that even
> > > > > with the custom driver was junk at best (1+MB kernel driver that crashed
> > > > > the system on unload - I did NOT write it just had to code around it).
> > > > >
> > > > To think that only 6 years ago geeks actually had phone lines... I'm
> > > > going to try to add a wireless card to the one pci slot, but I don't
> > > > think the motherboard layout will make this easy.
> > > >
> > > > -Brian
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> > >
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> James P. Kinney III
> CEO & Director of Engineering
> Local Net Solutions,LLC
> 770-493-8244
> http://www.localnetsolutions.com
>
> GPG ID: 829C6CA7 James P. Kinney III (M.S. Physics)
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