Floppy Drive Issues
 

Hello All,


I've recently come to posess an Amiga 1200 with a TEAC FD-235F floppy drive, however the floppy drive doesn't appear to work.


The drive powers up ok, the reader heads move into the default position. If I insert a disk it is detected by the drive and it spins up (I can see the media inside the floppy spinning) however after attempting to load for a couple of seconds the amiga will return to the insert disk screen.


I think the drive is making a strange noise but as I've not come across one before I can't be sure so I wondered if anyone else could confirm if it sounds right, I've attempted to record it here (audio is very quiet, apologies):
https://youtu.be/nkp238O-yV4
https://youtu.be/ISmI-MTmwOY


I've cleaned the heads with isopropyl alcohol on a cotton bud and also used an air duster on it, but the drive appears in relatively good and clean condition. I've read that my next step should potentially be replacing a prominent capacitor on the drive as only of the contacts next to it had a very feint yellowy/orange tinge to it, however I wondered with a voltmeter if there was any way to confirm that this capacitor was definitelty the issue.


I also have a Chiron FB-354 floppy drive (it has issues with the disk detection mechanism being a bit flakey but is otherwise fine) so I thought it might be an idea to connect this to the A1200 to see if we can eliminate the A1200 as being the issue, however this drive doesn't appear to recieve power when connected to the A1200.

I've managed to get both drives to power in an A500, though the TEAC exhibits the same issue, is there a reason the Chiron wouldn't power up in an A1200? I've tried it with both floppy power cables but get the same results.


Thanks in advance for any suggestions!

TEAC isn't native to the Amiga if I recall. So this must be a converted PC drive. You could try Amiga Test Kit to access the drive and motor functions manually.

PC drives run off only 5V whereas the Amiga has both 5V and 12V (which drives the motor). As such depending on the cable that was provided with TEAC there is possibility that it only supplies the 5V and not 12V which is needed for the motor.

It definitely is native to the Amiga. My A1200 also came with a TEAC dirve.



PC drives run off of either 5v, or 12v. It depends on the drive manufacturer, not on if it's an Amiga or PC drive.


All my PC drives run off of 5v.


All my Amiga drives also only run off of 5v.




That sound, I've heard it before. I don't remember why though!

Thanks for clarification. I hadn't even considered 5V Amiga drives lol. Why on Earth would they then use 12V motor... I just thought it was less efficient but alas I was wrong lol.

It's written on the drive though! Right on the label... 5v :p

Actually, drives that use the 12V rail mostly use *both* 5V and 12V, not either or :)

I've seen old Amiga drives that use 12V for the motor - I have a Mitsumi D357T2 here from an A500 that appears to need it, but any relatively "new" ones (e.g. A600 era on) seem to just use 5V. It's not a PC/Amiga thing, just the technology used at the time the drive model was produced.