In the Questions and Answers section of AMPLINEX 005 Bob
Cornford-Wood outlined the problems he had with his Opus Challenger disc system
and asked 'have any AMPLINEX members had similar problems with the Challenger
and solved them? I know that Slogger have taken over support from Opus, but
it's not really their problem. Any helpful comments gratefully received.'
It seems that several members have experienced similar
difficulties and we hope that their comments and suggestions may help to resolve
this issue.
From G H Richardson:
In response to Bob Cornford-Wood's appeal for help on the
Challenger disc drive I sent him (via AMPLINEX) a copy of correspondence I had
in 1986/7 which resulted in a full refund of the purchase price. For other
AMPLINEX members here is a potted version of events:
I had a BBC Model B and Music 500 and the Challenger looked
a very good buy at £300, particularly since they said there were no
compatibility problems.
11 May 86: Letter to Opus that the unit worked very well
with one exception - the purpose for which I had bought it - the Music 500;
that it reluctantly loaded the Music 500 disc after 1-5 efforts; that it would
not save programs to disc; that the BBC 'hung up'; and that discs were corrupted.
I asked them what could be done about it.
16 May 86: Reply from Opus that at present the Challenger
was incompatible with the Music 500 but they were trying to solve it and would let
me know if they did.
10 June 86: Letter to Hybrid Technology detailing problem.
12 June 86: Reply from Chris Jordan (Hybrid Technology) that
the Music 500 and Challenger were completely incompatible. He enclosed correspondence
he had had with Opus in which he said 'Challenger does not recognise the Acorn
protocol...I consider its design to be at fault in a fashion that is foolish
and irresponsible...and I see no solution with the current design'.
1 Oct 86: Letter to Opus setting out all foregoing story and
stating that having spent £300 I did not intend to be saddled with a unit which
did not do what it was alleged to do and drawing attention to the Sale of Goods
Act and the Trade Descriptions Act; that in an endeavour to resolve the matter
there were some options available; they could return my £300 and have the unit
back; or since the Challenger was useful in other spheres I could retain it for
general use and pay £75 for one of their single disc drives with interface
costing £150 on the assumption that this set-up would work. I asked them to
consider the matter and let me know.
27 Oct 86: Letter to Opus that I wrote to them on the 1 Oct
and now three weeks later I was still waiting to hear from them.
21 Nov 86: Letter to Opus referring to my previous letters,
neither of which had produced any response; that I had thought that Opus was a
reputable organisation which had the interests of its customers at heart; that
that impression was clearly erroneous; that it was absolutely disgraceful that
a company such as theirs which relied heavily on mail order customers should seek
to avoid its obligations by hiding behind silence and geographical distance.
I then set out the steps I proposed to take:
First - to send a copy of this 'one way' correspondence to
the BBC's 'Watchdog' programme.
Second - to send a similar copy to the Office of Fair
Trading for action by them.
Third - to send copies to all the periodicals in which they
advertised.
Fourth - if none of these produced a satisfactory result -
to issue a Writ for misrepresentation and substantial failure of consideration.
I stated that I would delay taking these steps in the hope
that they came to their senses, and that I was sending a copy of the letter to
their Chairman/Managing Director.
24 Nov 86: Ian Hirst (Technical Manager, Opus) rang me; he
apologized; agreed I had been misled; I could either have my money back or the
other option mentioned. He said my original letter of 1 Oct had been mislaid
but it had been replied to but they couldn't find a copy of the reply either.
He asked me to send a copy of my letter.
24 Nov 86: Sent Opus a copy of my letters of 1 Oct and 27
Oct. I also suggested another option that since the price of Challenger was now
£200 I keep it and they refund £100 to enable me to sort out my other disc
problem - all on the understanding that the new combined system (Challenger and
another disc unit) would operate on the BBC Master 128 which I was about to
acquire.
3 Dec 86: Telephone conversation with Hirst of Opus. Said he
had not received the copy letters sent on 24 Nov and asked me to read out the relevant
parts of my letter of 1 Oct. This I did and included the further option
mentioned above. He thought this last option made sense and agreed that I keep
Challenger and they refund £100. I reiterated that the new combined system must
work on my new Master 128 - no problem he said.
5 Dec 86: Cheque for £100 refund received from Opus.
11 Dec 86: Purchased Master 128 and Watford disc drive. For
the next three weeks I tried to make Challenger work with the Master without
success. I contacted Beebug and they said the Challenger was incompatible with
the Master and never would work with it.
5 Jan 87: Letter to Opus returning Challenger in disgust;
that I had again been misled by their assurance that it would work with the
Master when expert advice said it wouldn't; that despite the 'settlement'
agreed last month I now had a unit which was completely useless to me due to
their misrepresentations and that I wished them to refund to me the balance of the
£300 paid by me.
19 Jan 87: Letter from Hirst of Opus dated the 7 Jan arrived
together with cheque for £200 but reiterating that Challenger was not
incompatible with the Master.
20 Feb 87: Letter to Opus to thank them for sticking to
their promise to refund all the money and also to challenge their assertion
that the Challenger was compatible. I stated that I had again spoken to Beebug
and read them Opus' letter; that Beebug said they could not understand how Opus
could say this as it was definitely incompatible and could not be made to work
with the Master; that there was something wrong when two expert authorities
were in such direct conflict - they could not both be right; that in their own
interest they should clarify the matter for the sake of customers who had to
rely upon their statements.
From Scott Mackie:
If my memory serves me correctly the Challenger plugs into
the 1MHz bus. If this is true, then I'm afraid that there's no chance of the
Challenger working with AMPLE. This also holds true for the PMS Ramdisc system,
and any other system that uses &FCFF and page &FD to access I/O memory.
The problem lies in the fact that both the Music 500(0) hardware, and the
memory for the Ramdisc system need to access the same area of memory, i.e. Fred
and Jim in the I/O workspace.
Since the 500(0) hardware is write only, the Ramdisc can be
read without a data clash. However, when AMPLE writes the waveform information
into the Music 500(0) hardware, the Ramdisc also gets the information and is corrupted.
This corruption of data will cause extreme hassle!
This problem is a symptom of Acorn's lack of foresight over
the 1MHz bus. When the original specification was drawn up, the 64K of paged
ram that could be interfaced into page &FD was expected to be claimed by
only ONE add-on. Thus, no protocol, or token system, was developed to indicate what
code was master of the bus at any one time. Therefore, we have the problem that
any code written to access page &FD has to just assume that it is the only
code accessing the bus. The chaos this creates is unbelievable!
By using a latch address in page &FC, this problem could
be overcome, but as no one has thought to include it yet, I doubt if this
problem will ever be resolved. A real shame, as AMPLE booting from a Ramdisc
would be very useful.
So if the Challenger does use page &FD, as I suspect it
does, then there's really no chance of getting Opus to help any further, as it involves
hardware and software changes on their part.
From Michael Harbour:
I had the same problem with the Opus Challenger about six
months ago. I was interested in using the Music 500(0) but my Opus Challenger
stopped me. In the end I decided to buy another, cheaper, BBC computer and disc
drive. The problem was solved, although it was a little expensive.
I don't think it’s worth pursuing Opus. I think it could be
some time before the problem is solved (I'm not sure if Opus are doing anything
about it). They gave me the impression that they were in no hurry to rectify
the incompatibility.
As I see it there are two options:
1) Wait for the AMPLE/Challenger clash to be solved. This
could take rather a long time!
2) Buy a cheaper disc drive. I use the Watford CLS400 which
is perfect for AMPLE file storage.
From Mike Sandbach:
In answer to Bob Cornford-Wood, I have been talking to
Slogger about the problems with the Opus Challenger. They are about to produce
a hardware and software modification which should make the Challenger behave
'legally' with all other peripherals which use the 1MHz bus, including the
Music 500(0). I last spoke to Slogger on May 23rd, and was told this
modification was 'imminent'.
Editor's note:
We have had some response after the request in AMPLINEX 005
for information about ROMs which are incompatible with AMPLE. One member, Richard
Bettis, has sent us a list of ROMs which DO work with AMPLE, and on reflection
this seems like a good idea.
We intend to publish a summary of this information in the
next issue, so please send details of ROMs which do or do not work with AMPLE
in your machine in time for the submissions deadline (see 'Next issue news' in
the Introduction section). Please give details of your computer (BBC B, Master
etc.) and the ROM name and version number (if applicable).
Published in AMPLINEX 006, July 1988
