Hey all I found this article and decided to try it and it works! I converted a PC drive and it works on the Amiga!
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Here's how to convert a Chinon FZ-357 drive from PC to Amiga
Ok guys & gals, first an apology from me for telling {bleep} 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
