5,25" Drive Not Working!

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5,25" Drive Not Working!

Postby enon97 on Mon Jul 21, 2014 5:35 am

Hello all,

A friend just gave me a 5,25" floppy drive, I ran into my house and I installed it on my Desktop PC. It is correctly configured on the BIOS with another 3,5" drive that works perfectly.

It's an 1,2 Mb MITSUMI NEWTRONICS D509V5

Mi Desktop PC:

750 MB RAM DDR
80 GB HDD IDE Master
40 GB HDD IDE Slave
DVD-Rom player Master.
CD Writer Slave
Motherboard: P4VXAD+

Well, first of all, it doesn't read commercial diskettes. I cleaned the heads with a 5,25 cleaning diskette. When I try to format any floppy disk, it gives me a Track 0 error but, if I put something between the head and the little spring it has to get the head in contact with the floppy, It try to format my diskettes. And it does, but it takes a long time because the head is always going backwards and fordwards on the floppy. I wish you could help me to repair my floppy drive because where I live it's hard to get one.

Thanks a lot.

Bye.

enon97
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Re: 5,25" Drive Not Working!

Postby Clym5 on Mon Jul 21, 2014 9:19 am

I had a similar issue with my 5.25" drives, and the issue was actually the diskettes. Once I put some known-working ones in, it all worked fine.

I also recall some issues with 1.2mb drives not working well, or at all, with disks designed to be 360k. I might be wrong though! My only real experience with 5 inch disks is in the Commodore 64, so my knowledge wont help much since you're using a PC.
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Re: 5,25" Drive Not Working!

Postby SpidersWeb on Mon Jul 21, 2014 9:49 am

First of all check that your disks are:

a) high density
b) there is no crud or marks on the disk surface (old media that's been exposed to moisture often grows stuff)

If they are not high density 1.2Mb diskettes, and are actually 360KB double density - then you can try "FORMAT B: /F:360" or "FORMAT B: /9".
(Change B: to A: if required).

Running the cleaning disk again wouldn't hurt - make sure to use isopropyl alcohol (or equivilent) on the surface - I've found using them dry does not have the desired effect. The seeking of the head backwards and forwards is because DOS is finding errors and goes back to record each one it finds - a successful format should just step forward one by one until it finishes.
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Re: 5,25" Drive Not Working!

Postby RonTurner on Mon Jul 21, 2014 12:59 pm

SpidersWeb wrote:First of all check that your disks are:

a) high density
b) there is no crud or marks on the disk surface (old media that's been exposed to moisture often grows stuff)

If they are not high density 1.2Mb diskettes, and are actually 360KB double density - then you can try "FORMAT B: /F:360" or "FORMAT B: /9".
(Change B: to A: if required).

Running the cleaning disk again wouldn't hurt - make sure to use isopropyl alcohol (or equivilent) on the surface - I've found using them dry does not have the desired effect. The seeking of the head backwards and forwards is because DOS is finding errors and goes back to record each one it finds - a successful format should just step forward one by one until it finishes.


Don't leave your floppies where they will be exposed to direct sunlight, or hot or humid conditions (ie: sheds, garages are a roller coaster ride of hot and humid for your stuff.)


Two more points.

1. Meths is not R/W head cleaner, I.P.A. is R/W Head Cleaner (you can purchase small bottles at your local chemist) don't cut corners.

2. Don't put a double sided cleaner disk into a single sided Disk Drive or you will rip the pressure pad straight off.

The R/W head on your Disk Drive is supposed to make contact with the disk surface, and depending on whether you have a single
or double sided FDD, you will either have a second R/W head on top, if not you will have a (felt) pressure pad to keep
the floppy in contact with the R/W head.

[jokes]if you have already cleaned a single sided drive with a double sided cleaner disk, then maybe you should have something
holding whatever remains (like a bare plastic arm, with a mangled pad trailing off it ) off the disk surface ?[/jokes]
:D
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Re: 5,25" Drive Not Working!

Postby enon97 on Tue Jul 22, 2014 12:12 am

Hi!

Forgot to say, that you have photos/videos here: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ur1c4o3zajro ... vXfomDwvSa

My drive has two heads, so no problem. The disks I try are know-working, because they were precinted. The problem is the drive, because any disks works.

Hope you could help me to fix the problem.

Thanks.
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Re: 5,25" Drive Not Working!

Postby RonTurner on Thu Jul 24, 2014 4:00 pm

Its frustrating when things don't work isn't it ! They are definitely HD disks, you can only be sure these disks are working by trying them in a working
Disk Drive, they can look brand new and be defective.

1. If you haven't cleaned the R/W head with I.P.A. then dont waste your time proceeding any further, just give it up and dont waste any more time !
DO NOT REACH FOR THE METHS AND TELL US LATER " THE DRIVE DON'T WORK NO MORE BECAUSE I BUGGERED IT WITH METHS " !!!!

2. Take that SD memory card thats jacking up the spring (thats there to hold the R/W head on the disk surface) and get rid of it !
if one was meant to be there Shugart would have put one in the patent ! its impossible that lifting the R/W head away from
the disk surface will improve performance, just impossible !!!!

3. Google the serial number on the Drive to make sure its HD (or make sure any jumpers are set correctly)

4. Check to see that the correct options are set in the BIOS.

5. Check cable is correct floppy cable (with twist ?)

6. Try a new box of floppies (http://www.floppydisk.com)


Remember Don't Proceed without the I.P.A step first :D
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Re: 5,25" Drive Not Working!

Postby enon97 on Wed Aug 06, 2014 1:31 am

RonTurner wrote:Its frustrating when things don't work isn't it ! They are definitely HD disks, you can only be sure these disks are working by trying them in a working
Disk Drive, they can look brand new and be defective.

1. If you haven't cleaned the R/W head with I.P.A. then dont waste your time proceeding any further, just give it up and dont waste any more time !
DO NOT REACH FOR THE METHS AND TELL US LATER " THE DRIVE DON'T WORK NO MORE BECAUSE I BUGGERED IT WITH METHS " !!!!

2. Take that SD memory card thats jacking up the spring (thats there to hold the R/W head on the disk surface) and get rid of it !
if one was meant to be there Shugart would have put one in the patent ! its impossible that lifting the R/W head away from
the disk surface will improve performance, just impossible !!!!

3. Google the serial number on the Drive to make sure its HD (or make sure any jumpers are set correctly)

4. Check to see that the correct options are set in the BIOS.

5. Check cable is correct floppy cable (with twist ?)

6. Try a new box of floppies (http://www.floppydisk.com)


Remember Don't Proceed without the I.P.A step first :D



Yep, it is.

I have almost 200 disks, and no one is working.

1. Cleaned with 96º Alcohol, that works fine too (Tested in my 3,5" drives). Also, cleaned with a speceial cleaning diskette.

2. The SD memory card is there just to help de R/W upper head doing more pressure under the disk. If I remove that SD, the drive can't even format disks.

3. It's HD. I didn't touched the jumpers, I didn't find any manual.

4. Completeley correct configured with another 3,5" drive.

5. Cable with twist.

6. I think that no, because any disk from my 200 disks collection should work.

I think that's more a calibration problem, but I don't know.

Thank you.
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Re: 5,25" Drive Not Working!

Postby SpidersWeb on Wed Aug 06, 2014 7:30 am

I have one drive like this also, only works with extra head pressure. I attempted to 'adjust' the bracket that puts pressure on the head (figuring the spring is probably worn). I was concerned that if I got this pressure incorrect - I would end up wearing my disks out too fast (leaving scratches) so I just gave up and used another drive. 1.2Mb drives still turn up on trademe occasionally and are relatively inexpensive when they do (like $5).

However I would attempt more cleaning - with isopropyl (IPA) + cleaning disk say 3-4 times. The pushing down of the head makes it easier for the drive to read the media but you mentioned it going 'back and forward' - this is it finding bad sectors - so either the disk in that case was bad or even with the added pressure the drive is unable to read/write correctly (this could be circuitry, but most commonly from dirty heads).

One tip, although I'm not sure it's the case here, once you clean your drive - if you insert a dirty disk afterwards - the drive is quite likely to be dirty again. I have a box of about 160 disks that are all bad from age - for testing these drives I prefer to use new (or as-new condition at least) media.
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