A1200 Load problems

Hey all,

I'm hoping someone here may be able to help me with an incredibly annoying problem i have, but before i go too far i must warn you that i really know very little about amigas, other than i loved playing them when i was 6, so please bare with me.

A few months ago i got hit with the nostalgia stick, and bought myself an amiga 1200 from ebay, i used it for a while and then left it for a month or two until today.

I booted up today with swos, which all loaded and asked me for disk 2, which i had misplaced, so i used the 2 Amiga buttons + Ctrl(?) to reboot, with the intention of loading workbench to reset the pc>amiga connection i used to have.

Instead of putting the workbench floppy in, i put the amiga>pc software disk in by mistake, and obviously that didnt load (software is amiga forever). Realising my mistake i waited for the comp to return to the purple enter disk screen, and once it did i put workbench in......to which the floppy drive clicked 3 times and returned to the purple screen.

I tried 3 different workbench copies, all returning to the purple screen, infact all my disks now do this, even swos which had loaded not 15 minutes before.

As i say, i have no knowledge here, i do know that this A1200 does not have a HDD, and that basically any disk i insert will make the floppy light come on, it clicks 3 times (every time) and then gives up.

I am at a loss, especially since it had just booted a disk too .

Any help/advice appreciated, i hope i have covered everything.

[Amiga1992]

Probably your disk drive got dirty or misaligned with that disk. Sounds like a dead drive to me IMO.

Mine does that someties, it's a TEAC drie, I have to push the disk firmly in so it reads the disk. Try with that.

Otherwise open it up and check theconnectoins.

if all fails, yourdisk drive has gone onto the silicon heaven :P

Thanks for the response

I opened it up last night and to the best of my knowledge all the connections seemed fine, the drive was dusty so i removed it and blew it clean.

Reconnected it all, and got the same clicks from the drive as a result.

Its a panasonic disk drive by the way, incase that helps with anything.

I had also put disks in from softly-firmly-agressive with no better results.

looks like WinUAE will have to tide me over for now

Is it common for a drive to just die so....sudden?.

[Jope]

You might want to try cleaning and relubricating the stepper motor's worm screw and the rails on which the read write heads move.

Don't get grease on the heads and make sure you use a lubricant that doesn't run off the rails. Just a little will do it, no need to smother the thing in grease.

Well, i booted up for the first time today...and the drive has managed to load every disk thrown at it.

I'm praying it stays this way, and thank you for the helpfull advice, i appreciate it.

Kind Regards.

EDIT: lol, no sooner had i posted this, and i get the same problem as yesterday, hopefully this gives a clue as to the problem.

I have now also tried cleaning the drive.

[lloyd]

I agree with Jope - sounds like your drive needs a good clean out. I use a TINY smear of silicone grease (try Maplin Electronic Supoplies) on the stepper motor worm screw after you've cleaned off all the old grease (if there is still any there!). And, use a 3.5" floppy drive cleaning diskette - the type that needs a drop or two of cleaning solution on it is the type I'd say works best. Like Jope said tho, don't get any grease on the drive head itself or you'll contaminate any disk you put in the drive. Best of luck dude, hope all goes well for you