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Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Hardware Issues and discussion => Topic started by: IlyaZ on October 24, 2024, 12:28:45 PM

Title: A500+ 7 faulty floppy drives? 1 working?
Post by: IlyaZ on October 24, 2024, 12:28:45 PM
Hi,

I used to use A500+ in the 90ies as a kid. Basic user, mostly games and stuff. 10 years ago I inherited a lot of commodore hardware from an advanced user. Now I got around to restoring my old setup and to sell off surplus parts since space is more of an issue.

The floppy drives of my old A500+ began to fail already more than 20 years ago, but now none of them work, including the internal drive. The internal recognizes a disk and begins to read but I get sent back to kickstart main screen. Some external drives recognize the disk and begin to read, but then take forever to load. My other A500+ luckily has a working internal unit, and cross testing of floppy drives returns the same result there.

Is this a repairable condition?










Title: Re: A500+ 7 faulty floppy drives? 1 working?
Post by: F0LLETT on October 24, 2024, 03:05:46 PM
Hi,

I used to use A500+ in the 90ies as a kid. Basic user, mostly games and stuff. 10 years ago I inherited a lot of commodore hardware from an advanced user. Now I got around to restoring my old setup and to sell off surplus parts since space is more of an issue.

The floppy drives of my old A500+ began to fail already more than 20 years ago, but now none of them work, including the internal drive. The internal recognizes a disk and begins to read but I get sent back to kickstart main screen. Some external drives recognize the disk and begin to read, but then take forever to load. My other A500+ luckily has a working internal unit, and cross testing of floppy drives returns the same result there.

Is this a repairable condition?

First thing to try on any A500, is remove all socketed chips carefully and reseat them.
In my experience, it solved 99% of issues.

Also as its a +, hope you have removed the battery,as they leak bad and destroy stuff.
Title: Re: A500+ 7 faulty floppy drives? 1 working?
Post by: IlyaZ on October 24, 2024, 03:38:27 PM
I might try that. You think it could be an issue with the A500+ itself and not the individual drives?

Yes, I need to remove the batteries. Only consequence is that it won't keep track of time?
Title: Re: A500+ 7 faulty floppy drives? 1 working?
Post by: F0LLETT on October 24, 2024, 04:34:28 PM
I might try that. You think it could be an issue with the A500+ itself and not the individual drives?

Yes, I need to remove the batteries. Only consequence is that it won't keep track of time?

7 all with same fault, theres your answer there.

Yes, you will lose time. If it hasnt already you could also loose some track.
Title: Re: A500+ 7 faulty floppy drives? 1 working?
Post by: IlyaZ on October 24, 2024, 05:14:14 PM
I understand there are plenty of socketed chips on the mainboard of the A500+, but just to be clear, the socketed chips you mention, are they located on the disk drives themselves?
Title: Re: A500+ 7 faulty floppy drives? 1 working?
Post by: F0LLETT on October 25, 2024, 09:23:10 AM
I understand there are plenty of socketed chips on the mainboard of the A500+, but just to be clear, the socketed chips you mention, are they located on the disk drives themselves?

No. All the sockected chips in the A500.
Title: Re: A500+ 7 faulty floppy drives? 1 working?
Post by: IlyaZ on October 25, 2024, 03:10:26 PM
If I reseat them and it works, wouldn't that imply that the problem is with the A500-unit(s) and that the 7 faulty drives are fine?
Title: Re: A500+ 7 faulty floppy drives? 1 working?
Post by: F0LLETT on October 26, 2024, 02:09:49 PM
If I reseat them and it works, wouldn't that imply that the problem is with the A500-unit(s) and that the 7 faulty drives are fine?

Yes.