8 Oct
2005
8 Oct
'05
6:51 p.m.
Well some comments. I used to have a lot of them, most
all ahve died.
I regard that particular drive as junk.
Agreed completely.
The size problem.. I've encountered it with NS*
Horizon and Advantage.
However I put FD55BVs in the NS* after moving the rectifier as I
prefer them for reliability.
I found a few PC 360k drives (48tpi) marked Newtronics D503 which are
Mitsumi drives that seem ok and are the shorter length (7-3/8").
They look like the TEC drives but not quite.
I have toshiba, FD55xx(B, E, F and Gs) and they are the same length.
Older 286/386 PCs are the source of many of the TEC and mitsumi drives.
In this case the attempt is to keep the machine as original as possible.
I think replacing the drives is not too bad, however to put in a drive
with the data connector in the "wrong" place will require modification
to the interface board in the back of the disk enclosure, which I think
he would prefer not to do.
I've found a few Newtronics/Mitsumi HD drives which will fit (Data
connector is on the back left corner when drive faces you) ... one
option I am considering is to see if I can modify the motor control
board to go to 300 rpm (as far as I can tell there is no jumper) and
strap Pin2 to keep the drive in low-density mode - I can regen and
copy the disks to 80 track... But something more original would be
preferable if I can find it... Do the Newtronics DD drive have the
data connector in the position I described?
Note that it's not so much a size problem, as the fact that there is
a little board directly behind the drive with 1" cables for the data
connectors - you simply can't put in drives with the data connector
on the other side (which is where most of the drives I have put it).
Regards,
Dave
--
dave04a (at) Dave Dunfield
dunfield (dot) Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com
com Collector of vintage computing equipment:
http://www.parse.com/~ddunfield/museum/index.html