Floppy drive broken on 1040-ST
ja...@forward.to
software.
Unfortunately, the floppy disc drive is broken.
Does anyone know if I can just put a new bog-standard 3.5 inch floppy
drive in it's place, or is it some special type of drive?
Please help.
Jade
Bob Retelle
Replacing the drive in an Atari ST with a standard PC style floppy IS
a commonly done fix.
There are some caveats involved, but it should work well for you.
Is the floppy drive mounted inside the ST case, or is it in an
external case?
BobR
ja...@forward.to
wrote:
It's mounted inside the ST case.
Jade
Eric
http://www.mygale.org/romuald/atari/quickfaq/stfaq_3.htm#3
Not only does it tell you how, also why
<ja...@forward.to> wrote in message
news:3b698f61...@news.ntlworld.com...
Bob Retelle
>On Thu, 02 Aug 2001 16:20:01 -0400, Bob Retelle <bo...@provide.net>
>wrote:
>
>>
>>Replacing the drive in an Atari ST with a standard PC style floppy IS
>>a commonly done fix.
>>
>>There are some caveats involved, but it should work well for you.
>>
>>Is the floppy drive mounted inside the ST case, or is it in an
>>external case?
>>
>>
>>BobR
>
>It's mounted inside the ST case.
>
>Jade
Sorry- After I'd hit Return on that reply I looked back and saw that
you;d said it was a 1040ST. All the 1040s had internal floppy disk
drives. Oops.
Anyway, you can replace the internal floppy drive with a current PC
style floppy drive, with a few things to watch out for-
First of all, the 1040 cannot use High Density (1.44Meg) floppy disks
unless it's modified beyond a simple drive replacement. That's OK,
because all PC floppy drives will also work in Double Density (720K)
mode. You should be able to format DSDD (Double Sided, Double
Density) floppy disks for use with the ST with no problems at all.
Secondly, you can use ALMOST any normal PC floppy disk. The most
important thing to note is that the Atari ST requires the floppy disk
drive to be set as "Drive 0". Most all PC drives come set to be
"Drive 1". That's OK, as long as there is a jumper on the drive
allowing the setting to be changed to Drive 0. Unfortunately recent
PC floppy drives have been turning up which do NOT have a jumper to
change this setting since no one ever needs to do it normally.
You MUST insure that the floppy drive you plan to use has a jumper
allowing it to be set as Drive 0. For this reason, it's probably
best to buy it from a local dealer who has a competent service
department who will be able to tell if their drives meet this
requirement. CompUSA and Best Buy will undoubtedly NOT be able to
tell you if their drives do. Likewise, buying over the internet
would probably be risky unless you're absolutely sure you can get a
straight answer from the dealer before you buy the drive.
Next thing- the cable that plugs into the drive in the ST now, the
original drive, is most probably going to need to be turned "upside
down" to plug into the new drive properly. Most of the floppy drive
mechanisms Atari used had the connector backwards from what has become
the "standard" today. This usually isn't a problem, but on some
models the cable may be pretty short, and turning it over can be
difficult. The power connector from the old drive will fit the new
drive.
Then, the new drive is not going to fit into the same space the Atari
drive currently occupies, very well. The new drive will be thinner,
meaning you may have to work out some way to mount it, AND the
"faceplate" of the drive will not fit the same cutout opening in the
side of the ST. In most cases you can use an X-Acto knife and Razor
Saw to cut the case to fit.
Lastly, (and possibly the most troublesome part of all this), the way
Atari implemented the "Media Change Line" is different from the way
modern floppy drives work.
That is, when you pop out a disk and put a new one in the drive,
there is a signal generated which informs the computer of the change,
and alerts it that there is a new, different disk in the drive now.
Because the new PC floppy does this differently, the ST is not going
to have a reliable way to tell that there is a new disk when you
change them.
The ramification of this is that if you open a disk, to get the
directory, then pop it out and put in a new disk, then write a file
out to the new disk, the Atari won't know the disk has changed, and
will use the directory of the old disk to save the file on the new
disk. This will trash the new disk.
You can avoid this potentially disastrous situation by closing the
directory window and reopening it when the new disk is in the drive.
This should read the new directory in from the new disk.
You can also press the ESC key when a directory window is open, which
will force a re-read of the directory.
There is also a way to modify the new PC floppy drive to emulate the
Atari Media Change Line signal, but unfortunately I haven't been able
to locate the text files that tell how to do this.
You COULD just try to find another Atari floppy drive to replace the
one in the 1040ST. In that case replacing the drive is a very simple
matter of swapping the mechanism.
However, there are no new units available, so you have to find a used
one. If you look on eBay, in the "Classic Computers" category (I
think that's what they call it), you can occasionally find people
selling external disk drives. These were used as the main disk drive
for the old, original 520ST, and as the "B" drive for units like your
1040ST. These often sell for next to nothing, and you could easily
take the case apart and use the floppy disk mechanism to replace the
one in your 1040. If you decide to do this, be sure to look for
model SF314, which was the Double Sided model.
The drawback to doing this is that any floppy drive you get would be
easily as old as the one you're replacing.
The advantage of course is you could avoid all the "gotchas" of using
a PC drive.
Good luck!
BobR
Steve Stupple
<bo...@provide.net> writes
>
>Then, the new drive is not going to fit into the same space the Atari
>drive currently occupies, very well. The new drive will be thinner,
>meaning you may have to work out some way to mount it, AND the
>"faceplate" of the drive will not fit the same cutout opening in the
>side of the ST. In most cases you can use an X-Acto knife and Razor
>Saw to cut the case to fit.
hmmm.. all the drives i have for pc's are all the same size!!!! maybe
this is something to do with cases and their 3.5" bays!!!!!!
Only the old single sided drives are larger in the ST, the other are the
same size as the high density drive pc's use.
>
>Lastly, (and possibly the most troublesome part of all this), the way
>Atari implemented the "Media Change Line" is different from the way
>modern floppy drives work.
>
>That is, when you pop out a disk and put a new one in the drive,
>there is a signal generated which informs the computer of the change,
>and alerts it that there is a new, different disk in the drive now.
iirc the atari monitors the read/write protect line to detect a disk
change.
>
>Because the new PC floppy does this differently, the ST is not going
>to have a reliable way to tell that there is a new disk when you
>change them.
>
>The ramification of this is that if you open a disk, to get the
>directory, then pop it out and put in a new disk, then write a file
>out to the new disk, the Atari won't know the disk has changed, and
>will use the directory of the old disk to save the file on the new
>disk. This will trash the new disk.
>
>You can avoid this potentially disastrous situation by closing the
>directory window and reopening it when the new disk is in the drive.
>This should read the new directory in from the new disk.
>
>You can also press the ESC key when a directory window is open, which
>will force a re-read of the directory.
not always:((( pressing the ESC key is a way of finding out if the
machine has detected a change of media and WILL updated it if it has
noticed it.
BUT it may not work all the time.
I use the ESC key test for incompatible 3.5" floppy drives, if you
change a disk and press ESC it SHOULD updated the buffers/cache and
display the new directory!!
If it doesn't then the drive isn't detecting the change of media etc.
There are programs around this to allow a force media change.
My advice anyway, even on a atari with original drive, is to check that
the directory window has been updated AFTER every disk change.
This incidentally isn't just a problem for high density drives but also
double density drives as well.
>
>There is also a way to modify the new PC floppy drive to emulate the
>Atari Media Change Line signal, but unfortunately I haven't been able
>to locate the text files that tell how to do this.
>
>
>You COULD just try to find another Atari floppy drive to replace the
>one in the 1040ST. In that case replacing the drive is a very simple
>matter of swapping the mechanism.
>
>However, there are no new units available, so you have to find a used
>one. If you look on eBay, in the "Classic Computers" category (I
>think that's what they call it), you can occasionally find people
>selling external disk drives. These were used as the main disk drive
>for the old, original 520ST, and as the "B" drive for units like your
>1040ST. These often sell for next to nothing, and you could easily
>take the case apart and use the floppy disk mechanism to replace the
>one in your 1040. If you decide to do this, be sure to look for
>model SF314, which was the Double Sided model.
You can also use external drive mechanisms for the amiga as companies
like zydec use the same type of mechanism just different cable:))
The Amiga A1200 uses a standard double density floppy with the standard
shurgart interface. Not sure whether other models do though!
I know many people that have used external drive mechanisms to replace
the internal one.
The only problem being some case cutting is usually needed. Even with
drives from the original Atari external drives, as not all ST's comform
to the same eject button.
>
>The drawback to doing this is that any floppy drive you get would be
>easily as old as the one you're replacing.
>
>The advantage of course is you could avoid all the "gotchas" of using
>a PC drive.
-- Cheers! For Now
Steve <>< * * *
Email: st...@atari.org.uk * * *
Tel: 0870 7411273 * Dfax: 0870 0521124 'The Fuji Bounces Back'
ICQ: 18116827 * Nick: MocknBird on IRC * * *
Location: Kilgetty, Pembrokeshire, Wales, UK. ** *** **