Floppy replacement on an A500

[DocSane]

Hi all,

Well, I hit a slight snag with one of my eBay sales. My old 500 apparently arrived with a broken floppy ejection button. The buyer says that he doesn't want to return it, but the damage would normally be a show stopper. I want to do right by the guy, so I want to know if there's a reasonably-priced (i.e. in the $15-$20 range) replacement for an Amiga low-density drive that I can send the guy as a replacement. He paid me over $100 for my A500, so I feel I owe it to him to get a working drive.

Does anyone here have a line on sources and compatible drives? I've already found the page over at http://www.freewebs.com/computolio/amiga_floppy_compatibility.html, but the drives listed are so old that I wonder if any of the newer variants might also be usable. For example, I can buy TEAC FD-235HF series floppy drives fairly easily and cheaply, but I don't know if the newer variants work properly. Does anyone out there have some experience with this?

Thanks!

[DocSane]

weirdami wrote:
is it just the plastic button cover thing that's broken so he can still eject things but just needs a stick or are the drive innards broken so no ejecting is possible?

You know, that's an excellent question. I'll try and find out from him and get some pictures, too.

[DocSane]

Well, it seems the buyer was just satisfied with me offering to buy him a replacement drive and told me not to take it any further. So, I'm technically off the hook, but I'm still interested if anyone out there has a line on where to get replacement floppy drives for the 500 that don't cost as much as the 500 itself.

Again, I ask, does anyone have a line on this?

[DocSane]

TjLaZer wrote:

Has the buyer tried to see if the eject button can be fixed?  I as able to glue mine back on and it was very secure and worked great.  It's just a plastic piece that clips on.

He said that he still has a 500 and that this was essentially a backup, so he does have a drive to use if one machine breaks. He told me not to worry about it and that I didn't need to send him a new drive or anything, but I'm still trying to help him get a line on getting a working one. I'll ask him about the possibility of gluing it back together.

[DocSane]

a1200 wrote:
Link

Excellent! Cheers for the link!