Here's how to convert a Chinon FZ-357 drive from PC to Amiga :)

[Overdoc]

Ok guys & gals, first an apology from me for telling shit for some time now:
I always thought converting a Chinon FZ-357 drive from PC to Amiga was just a job of playing with the jumpers on the back of the drive. This worked fine for the drive I had, so I didn't notice that my drive in fact had already been converted !
But now I got another FZ-357 drive and was very surprised that it didn't work on an A-500 after I set the jumpers exactly like on my FZ-357 ?!? So, I disassembled both and discovered that it is also necessary to close one jumper ! Did this to the new drive, and now it works perfectly in an Amiga like the other one I had before

Ok, here is how to do it:

First, set the jumpers on the back:
You have to close DS0, MM, RDY and TTL/C-MOS
So there is one horizontal jumper in the lower row between pins 2 & 3, and 3 horizontal jumpers between upper and lower row on positions 4, 6 and 7.

Ok, this was the easy part, now you have to disasemble the drive:

First, take off the top cover of the drive by lifting it from the side of the drive. Then carefully pull off the front cover ( if there is one )
Now turn the drive upside down and unscrew 2 screws which fix the drive to the lower part of the case. After this, bend the lower case a little bit to the outside and remove the big spring which goes across the drive from left to right.

Now, very carefully take the drive out of the lower case. Take care not to loose the upper part of the drive !! Hold it down with one finger while removing the drive from it's case !
Once you have done this, turn the drive upside down and have a look on the board. About in the middle, there are 2 square dots marked with 'J2'.
Now, what you have to do is apply a solder blop to close this jumper. Be very careful the blop isn't too big because otherwise you will close some contacts you wouldn't want to be closed

Now, that's all
Build the drive back together ( fiddling the disk slot into the right place can take some time ), hook it up to your Amiga like a Amiga drive and it will work 100% with all disks ! This modified drive will also work with NDOS disks and such that require a correct 'ready-signal'.

Now, rush to your local used PC dealer and grab all FZ-357 drives you can get for cheap. They might well become useful one day

[jmmijo]

Good info there Overdoc and I like your solder blop technique there

[Syko]

Yep, me too! From now on I'm replacing all my sloder blobs with blops, they're much nicer

[Overdoc]

Hey, I must have caused something funny by my b-p error !
But since English is not my mother language as everyone can see , what does 'blop' mean then ? I looked it up in a dictionary but didn't find anything ?!?

[Jherek Carnelia]

You didn't find anything because it doesn't exist! It is an Overdocian word...

[scaf]

hehe
this would have helped me when i tried to plug my fz357 in my a2000 !

i knew i wasn't crazy when the drive didn't work though i jumpered it correctly

[Codetapper]

Sorry for sounding ignorant (I am a software hacker not hardware!) but what exactly is so special about this drive? Is it a HD floppy drive or something? Are they being thrown out on lots of PC's etc?

[jmmijo]

Originally posted by scaf
i knew i wasn't crazy when the drive didn't work though i jumpered it correctly

You just neglected to BLOP it

[Overdoc]

The special thing is that this type of drive can be found rather easily in old PCs, but can be modified for use in an Amiga like I described. This can be very helpful becuase Amiga drives are getting hard to get, and if you do find one at some dealer then it normally costs at least 30 Euro/$ !
The drive is an HD drive, but on the Amiga you can only use it as a standard 880k drive.
I have also seen some of these being built into A-2000 desktops from factory That's why I thought it cannot be much of a problem converting them from PC to Amiga

[Syko]

The drive is an HD drive, but on the Amiga you can only use it as a standard 880k drive.

Because cheap-ass Commodore decided to have a half speed HD floppy which cost twice as much as upgrading the FDD controller!

DOH!

If I ever get the chance I'm going to skin them and dip them in salt and vinegar.....

[jmmijo]

Originally posted by Syko
If I ever get the chance I'm going to skin them and dip them in salt and vinegar.....

That was done by the bankruptcy courts and creditors already

[Syko]

Yea but they weren't nasty enough on a personal level with the :kill (!"£$%^&*&^%$£"!) :kill bean counters who fcuked it up because they knew nothing about computers, or the Amiga, or what made it good.

10,000 years being roasted over hot coals while being basted with concentrated battery acid would be far too nice a fate for these scum.

I can't find the words to describe just how much I loath and detest them and what they did.

[jmmijo]

OK Syko, tell us how you really feel

[Syko]

Ok then, { THIS POST HAS BEEN CENSORED ON THE GROUNDS OF TASTE AND DECENCY }'s! Is what I really feel.

[jmmijo]

Originally posted by Syko
Ok then, { THIS POST HAS BEEN CENSORED ON THE GROUNDS OF TASTE AND DECENCY }'s! Is what I really feel.

[mtb]

Yes, it's quite easy to be found ( i've found it to the place where old cars are "stored", dunno both the english and the italian term, only the local one: rùtamàt ).

[ look at the picture, the first i think comes from an amiga, the second it's the 357 )

Since the original floppy still works, i would like to know if it's possible [ and how in the case ] to build a cable to connect one of them to the external drive port.

[jmmijo]

Isn't the jumper block to the right of the data cable connector the one you need to properly jumper to get it working as a DS/DD drive???

[mtb]

Yes, i think it's the right one. But i have also to modify the internal jumper, and the drive on the left i think comes from an amiga, so it should work without being modified.

[Overdoc]

The left drive ( FB-354 ) is an Amiga drive and you don't have to modify anything.
The other one is the one you have to modify like I described above.

If you want to use it as internal drive it nees jumper DS0 set, and if you want to use it in an external drive case then jumper it as DS1.

It should be possible to build a cable and hook the drive up as external ( maybe with an aditional TTL chip ), but believe me, it wouldn't be worth the effort because both connectors and the cable alone will cost you more than a cheap used external drive. Maybe even here someone has one for sale ?
Better keep the FZ-357 drive as a spare if one of your Amiga drives should fail one time ? It is always good to have spare ones !

[mtb]

Originally posted by Overdoc
It should be possible to build a cable and hook the drive up as external ( maybe with an aditional TTL chip ), but believe me, it wouldn't be worth the effort because both connectors and the cable alone will cost you more than a cheap used external drive.

Ok. Thank you for the info.

Some of the Chinon FZ-357 disk drives already have a trace connecting the J2 pads. What I would like to know is what is the difference between the FB-354 and the FZ-357? They both look the same. I think that the FB-354 is an FZ-357 with the mod and jumpers already set for the Amiga computer. Do any of you guys know how to set up these drives to work on the Atari 1040ST computer?

[a_petri]

Originally Posted by DoomMaster

Some of the Chinon FZ-357 disk drives already have a trace connecting the J2 pads. What I would like to know is what is the difference between the FB-354 and the FZ-357? They both look the same. I think that the FB-354 is an FZ-357 with the mod and jumpers already set for the Amiga computer.

There are more differences AFAIK:
- the FB-354 (at least the ones I saw) is 1.6" high - to fit to the A2000 case - , while most PC 3.5" FDDs that are 1" high;

- the FB-354 is *designed* to be a DD drive, as it cannot distinguish between 720K and 1.44M floppy disks. If you push the front slit cover in, you'll see that there is only one microswitch in it, on the right side (which is the write protection sensor), while PC 3.5" FDDs also have a microswitch on the left side (to detect the lack of hole on 720K floppy disks).

Moreover, the early series of Chinon FZ-357 drives have a PCB which can be hacked to make an Amiga 1760KB HD disk drive! I have an old Hungarian magazine article about this hack - I'll translate it and present it here if anyone is interested ;-)

[Marcuz]

Originally Posted by mtb

Yes, it's quite easy to be found ( i've found it to the place where old cars are "stored", dunno both the english and the italian term, only the local one: rùtamàt ).

HAHAHHAHHAHAHAhah... Giulio, non mi ricordo più, ma sei piemontese?

[Marcuz]

Originally Posted by a_petri

Moreover, the early series of Chinon FZ-357 drives have a PCB which can be hacked to make an Amiga 1760KB HD disk drive! I have an old Hungarian magazine article about this hack - I'll translate it and present it here if anyone is interested ;-)

i'm ignorant about tech stuff: would it be useful in amiga-pc transfer stuff? how would it be reknown by amiga? would it still work with 880kb disks?
thank you

Originally Posted by a_petri

There are more differences AFAIK:
- the FB-354 (at least the ones I saw) is 1.6" high - to fit to the A2000 case - , while most PC 3.5" FDDs that are 1" high;

- the FB-354 is *designed* to be a DD drive, as it cannot distinguish between 720K and 1.44M floppy disks. If you push the front slit cover in, you'll see that there is only one microswitch in it, on the right side (which is the write protection sensor), while PC 3.5" FDDs also have a microswitch on the left side (to detect the lack of hole on 720K floppy disks).

Moreover, the early series of Chinon FZ-357 drives have a PCB which can be hacked to make an Amiga 1760KB HD disk drive! I have an old Hungarian magazine article about this hack - I'll translate it and present it here if anyone is interested ;-)

I am very interested in that hack.

[a_petri]

Originally Posted by DoomMaster

I am very interested in that hack.

All right, but it may be a bit long and technical, so I put it onto a separate web page
here:

http://www.inf.mit.bme.hu/private/fz357/

It is not a very easy task - it includes some rather delicate soldering work and the building of a small electronic circuit -, but the result is a fully working Amiga high density floppy drive unit, virtually equivalent with the original Commodore one.

It practically means that PC <-> Amiga file transfers can be made with standard 1.44MB PC-formatted floppy disks. Naturally it remains compatible with 880K Amiga floppy disks as well.

Originally Posted by a_petri

All right, but it may be a bit long and technical, so I put it onto a separate web page
here:

http://www.inf.mit.bme.hu/private/fz357/

It is not a very easy task - it includes some rather delicate soldering work and the building of a small electronic circuit -, but the result is a fully working Amiga high density floppy drive unit, virtually equivalent with the original Commodore one.

It practically means that PC <-> Amiga file transfers can be made with standard 1.44MB PC-formatted floppy disks. Naturally it remains compatible with 880K Amiga floppy disks as well.

I just want to use the Chinon FZ-357 disk drives as 880K Amiga drives. I am not interested in high-density drives. The standard for the Amiga is 880K, so that is what I will use. I am buying up all of the DS/DD disks that I can find on eBay and other places and storing them away in my closet for future use. I plan to keep and use my Amiga and Atari ST computers for the next 30+ years. I am also stocking up on mice, keyboards, custom chips, DRAMs, Zorro II/III boards, power suppies, cases, disk drives, SCSI hard drives and CD Rom drives. I am also buying up the Commodore A2320 and A2091 boards. I am also stocking up on Amiga Zorro II/III video boards. Now I have a closet full of spare parts. I find the Chinon FZ-357 disk drives at my local Goodwill Outlet all the time. I also find the Teac disk drives that work with the Amiga with NO MODs. I must have over a hundred (100) of these disk drives so far. Sometimes I sell the high-quality Teac disk drives for About $250.00 each. They are very nice drives and are very hard to find. I have just been lucky. Only a few of the Teac drive models will work with the Amiga. The only bad thing that I can say about them is that they do not like to go out past track 82, so some copy-protected games will not work on the Teac disk drives.

[Syko]

Thanks for that web page a_petri, very very usefull (copied to my HD already ) I'l have to check out the aminet file as well.

Originally Posted by Overdoc

Ok, here is how to do it:

First, set the jumpers on the back:
You have to close DS0, MD, RDY and TTL/C-MOS
So there is one horizontal jumper in the lower row between pins 2 & 3, and 3 horizontal jumpers between upper and lower row on positions 4, 6 and 7.

Doc did you make an error? Is it MM that needs to be jumpered or MD? MD is horizontally not vertically. MM is like the other two: RDY and TTL/C-MOS.

[TjLaZer]

Overdock I did the mod and it works! You make a type to its MM not MD to jumper!

[Jope]

Originally Posted by DoomMaster

I also find the Teac disk drives that work with the Amiga with NO MODs. I must have over a hundred (100) of these disk drives so far. Sometimes I sell the high-quality Teac disk drives for About $250.00 each. They are very nice drives and are very hard to find. I have just been lucky.

Heh.. $250.. :-D A 3.5" floppy drive is worth just about $25.. You yourself said you have about 100 of them? For how much did you get 'em yourself? $5 apiece?

I mean you can buy a real Sony half-speed mechanism for less than $250 from an Amiga retailer.

C'mon.

Originally Posted by Jope

Heh.. $250.. :-D A 3.5" floppy drive is worth just about $25.. You yourself said you have about 100 of them? For how much did you get 'em yourself? $5 apiece?

I mean you can buy a real Sony half-speed mechanism for less than $250 from an Amiga retailer.

C'mon.

Well then, I suggest you go buy them because I sell mine for between $95.00 for used and $250.00 for brand new Teac disk drives that work with the Amiga and Atari ST computers. These vintage disk drives are actually very hard to find. If you do not believe me just try to find them on the internet. I managed to find only a few places that still have some left in stock. These places know that these are rare disk drives because they charge at least $100.00 for each drive.

[Akira]

What a THIEF!

Originally Posted by Akira

What a THIEF!

NO, I am NOT a "THIEF"! The Teac disk drives that work with the Amiga and Atari ST computers or very hard to get. They are THE highest quality disk drives that you can get for these computers. They are not produced anymore, so trying to find one brand new or in like new condition is tough. Akira, I issue you a challenge: Find these disk drives and display the web sites where they can be bought right here in this forum. Make sure that they are the Teac disk drives that work with the Amiga and Atari ST computers WITHOUT any mods. Comeon, big-mouth! Let's see how you like being called names, punk! You will probably just delete this and ban the one of many IPs that I use.

You can find a working drive from an a500 free from the junkyard. I can easily find an amiga drive for about 1$ here from the junk market here. There's really no point defending the 250$ price. Get 250 drives, some will be teac, if it's THAT important

Originally Posted by Burseg

You can find a working drive from an a500 free from the junkyard. I can easily find an amiga drive for about 1$ here from the junk market here. There's really no point defending the 250$ price. Get 250 drives, some will be teac, if it's THAT important

Ok, let's see you find them. Good luck.

[Akira]

Originally Posted by DoomMaster

Comeon, big-mouth! Let's see how you like being called names, punk! You will probably just delete this and ban the one of many IPs that I use.

That's just not how this place work, you would be surprised. If you want moderation of that type, I encourage you to LEAVE the EAB and join http://www.lemonamiga.com/forum , there they will treat you like you are used to.

By the way, your reputation speaks for itself. I'm in no need of namecalling.

[TjLaZer]

Just a necro bump as I did one Chinon FZ-357 drive last night.

If you have the Japan model you need to jumper J2 AND J18. Leave J20 alone. Works great!

Malaysia models just need J2 jumpered.

[jimbobrocks92]

Originally Posted by TjLaZer

Just a necro bump as I did one Chinon FZ-357 drive last night.

If you have the Japan model you need to jumper J2 AND J18. Leave J20 alone. Works great!

Malaysia models just need J2 jumpered.

Sorry for the bump

Does/did this work with HD disks? (effectivly turning it into an amiga hd floppy drive)

[Jope]

That is indeed the allure of the FZ-357.. With those modifications it becomes an FZ-357A :-)