ScanMate drum scanner DIY maintenance, troubleshooting, mods

sheel said:
Ok I'll check the firmware. Something to note. When it's not in ready mode the service program just repeats "hello world" infinitely.
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So, I finally figured out what the problem was with my primary scanner and the random resetting issue - a bad scsi card. It finally gave out this past week and become completely unresponsive. I swapped in the scsi card from my backup scanner (phew for spare parts!) and it's now working perfectly. No more random resets.

As for the backup scanner, well, I'm not sure why it was repeating "Hello World" infinitely... obviously was not the scsi card, cause it's functioning in my primary now.

For some reason, there are little green soldered wires on this bad scsi card that I took out of the primary - I wonder if someone tried to hack a solution together?... who knows.
 
Your scanner is running beautifully Sheel! Congrats on finally having it all up and running. It should serve you well now.

So, I have a favor to ask if anyone is able to help with a Control Board for a SM5K. One of my "project" scanners that I have learned so much on is almost fully back to life with the exception of the spindle (the stepper motor that moves the spindle back and forth doesn't run). I have narrowed down the issue to the Control Board as both the Power Supply and the Stepper motor are fine. I know it is a long shot but I would greatly appreciate it if someone has non-working unit or an extra control board that they are willing to part with.

Thank you!

Pali
 
That's great news Jack. Have you or anyone you know ever replaced PMTs with a fresh one? I have had a few of these scanners now and seemed that PMTs were still performing OK after many years of use.

Pali
 
Seems like Michael at abc-scan is still very much helping with these scanners. He has shipped a controller board for me at a very reasonable price.

Pali
 
My Scanmate 5000 has never managed to read a barcode in it's life as far as I'm aware so I decided to try and run the monitoring program to check what might be the cause.


I found an old Serial to USB adapter I had used with Cisco networking equipment in the past to great success. The monitoring program comes up fine but doesn't accept my keyboard input.


Anyone have a clue what might be keeping it from accepting my input? I have the dipswitch 8 set. When I have the Mac which has the SCSI connection turned off it just spams Hello World on the serial line. As soon as I turn on the Mac it shows me the monitoring program on the PC with the serial connection. I tried to start CQscan and as it should it failed to detect the scanner since the SCSI is supposed to be down.
 
Sjon said:
My Scanmate 5000 has never managed to read a barcode in it's life as far as I'm aware so I decided to try and run the monitoring program to check what might be the cause.


I found an old Serial to USB adapter I had used with Cisco networking equipment in the past to great success. The monitoring program comes up fine but doesn't accept my keyboard input.


Anyone have a clue what might be keeping it from accepting my input? I have the dipswitch 8 set. When I have the Mac which has the SCSI connection turned off it just spams Hello World on the serial line. As soon as I turn on the Mac it shows me the monitoring program on the PC with the serial connection. I tried to start CQscan and as it should it failed to detect the scanner since the SCSI is supposed to be down.
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Did you create the cable yourself and match the pinouts as described in this thread earlier? If not, the wiring may not be correct for sending keystrokes back to the scanner. Also, I am not sure how the terminal program will help you resolve the barcode problem as most likely, it's a lens alignment or faded barcode issues. Look at the back of the scanner with the drum removed and if you see a red light, then your barcode chip is working properly and you need to troubleshoot alignment or barcode sticker quality.

Pali
 
Thank you for the advice Pali. I was going through the service manual at some point and saw there was an option to let it self test the barcode circuitry. I thought I might as well try that. I checked and I do see the red light. The barcodes seem to be in quite a good state on both of my drums. I'll have to fiddle with the different parts a bit.


In regards to the cable, these are genuine serial to rj45 cables used in the past with Cisco networking equipment. They use the same type of configuration where you connect to the device over a serial console.


I'll check if the pinout is different on these devices, it would be quite lucky if it's such a simple fix.


I'm really pleased so far with this Scanmate 5000, I hadn't expected my main worries to be small quality of life issues like worrying about it reading the barcodes 🙂


EDIT: you were exactly correct in terms of the barcode reader being the problem. It seemed clean when I looked at it but I decided to clean it with some alcohol to be sure either way. It picked up the barcode right away after that.
 
Recently I replaced my lamps for the first time now that both had finally died. It seems the previous owner hadn't done so in almost two decades. The pins were extremely tight in the socket. I had to use a bench rest and a hammer to bash em out. It seems I might have mangled one of the sockets a little, it doens't grip the pins very well anymore.


Oh well, all in the life of old equipment I guess. I'll find a way to keep it seated at some point, I'm already glad these lamps are still being made, they work just as well as the two decade old ones.
 
Any recommendations for a SCSI card that works in PCIE slots and win10? As im upgrading my PC, but the new mobo no longer has PCI slot.
 
I have a similar setup to you. I use an Adaptec AVA-2906 I took out of a Mac. It works perfectly fine under Windows 10 64 bit.
Not having a PCI slot doesn't have to be a problem. I didn't have a PCI slot either but after some research it turns out a PCIe slot can carry a PCI signal. What you will need is an adapter to be able to fit the card.


I bought this adapter to get it working. https://www.ebay.nl/itm/25340488111...04&_trkparms=gh1g=I253404881117.N41.S2.R1.TR1
There are a large amount of reviews for the card people who didn't manage to get it working, I'm not sure how much of that is operator error but it works for me with this particular SCSI card and my motherboard (Asrock Z97 Extreme 6).


PCIe SCSI cards are very expensive, it's probably worth trying an adapter first.
 
Sjon said:
I have a similar setup to you. I use an Adaptec AVA-2906 I took out of a Mac. It works perfectly fine under Windows 10 64 bit.
Not having a PCI slot doesn't have to be a problem. I didn't have a PCI slot either but after some research it turns out a PCIe slot can carry a PCI signal. What you will need is an adapter to be able to fit the card.


I bought this adapter to get it working. https://www.ebay.nl/itm/25340488111...04&_trkparms=gh1g=I253404881117.N41.S2.R1.TR1
There are a large amount of reviews for the card people who didn't manage to get it working, I'm not sure how much of that is operator error but it works for me with this particular SCSI card and my motherboard (Asrock Z97 Extreme 6).


PCIe SCSI cards are very expensive, it's probably worth trying an adapter first.
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Ok, thanks for the information. I was aware of the adapters, but opted purchasing a PCIE card in the end as i was a bit worried about complications the adapter might bring in.

Ordered Adaptec ASC-29320LPE, they seem to be going for around 20$ shipped from china. So not expensive.

I will report back eventually when i get it to let people know if it will do the trick.

It should work in WIN10 using these drivers:

http://www.savagetaylor.com/2018/02...-adaptec-29xx-ultra-or-aic-7870-adaptec-78xx/
 
monkeyfist said:
Ok, thanks for the information. I was aware of the adapters, but opted purchasing a PCIE card in the end as i was a bit worried about complications the adapter might bring in.

Ordered Adaptec ASC-29320LPE, they seem to be going for around 20$ shipped from china. So not expensive.

I will report back eventually when i get it to let people know if it will do the trick.

It should work in WIN10 using these drivers:

http://www.savagetaylor.com/2018/02...-adaptec-29xx-ultra-or-aic-7870-adaptec-78xx/
Click to expand...

Thank you for posting this. Looking forward to hear how it works out for you because I am holding onto an older Win 7 machine just for my scanner. It would be nice to move everything to the new machine.

Pali
 
Netsoft2k said:
Seems like Michael at abc-scan is still very much helping with these scanners. He has shipped a controller board for me at a very reasonable price.

Pali
Click to expand...

Help me modify the Control Board on my SM11K !!!
Please, show photos of their boards in good quality - and the details of the changes are larger!

Here is a picture of my board:
9449914432_6725b38ed3_o.jpg



P.S.
I was writing off with ABS-Scan, but Michael replied that the service was closed, nothing more ... 😡

And the question on the head of the scanner, what kind of color filters are there?
Does it make sense to put LEDs 5000K, or RGBW LEDs adjusted to 5000K?
 
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