A2000 Floppy Died

[rcgrabbag]

Another noob question. I have an A2000 and the floppy just died. It was the original double-density 3.5 floppy. I installed a high density floppy and it worked OK, I was able to format a HD diskette, no problem. Buttoned the machine back up and now when it boots, the workbench screen cursor is a stopwatch and I can't do anything. I put the old floppy back in, and it boots fine and works normally, but the old floppy drive of course is dead. I put the HD floppy back in, got the stopwatch again. I don't understand why it worked the first time and I was able to format an HD diskette.

[save2600]

There's a jumper underneath the power supply/drive harness that you need to enable. What you're doing is telling the machine to enable DF1: the 2nd floppy in the system. System probably won't boot and will act strangely if you have two internal drives and that's not set. Too bad that jumper is underneath all that stuff    

Oh and where did a noob find a HD disk drive for a Miggy? Did you modify a PC one? Do you have the right twisted ribbon cable going to it?

Find out what mobo revision you have and Google yourself 'Amiga 2000 jumpers'...

[rcgrabbag]

OK, now I'm REALLY confused. If I understand you correclty, and clarify what I was originally asking in the correct way, I didn't put two diskette drives in at the same time, I pulled the bad one out, and then connected an HD diskette drive from an A4000, so only one diskette drive was in at any one time. The ribbon cable in the A2000 has a twist in it. So, from what you were saying, can I even put an HD diskette drive in an A2000? The first time I put in the HD drive in the A2000, it worked fine and I was able to format an HD diskette (at least it appeared to format normally). I'm not sure what happened after that and why it stopped working.

[save2600]

Oh... sorry to confuse. I think I assu(me)d. lol   One drive- gotcha.

Umm... what OS are you running? Sounds like you might have OS2.x or OS3.x if you're seeing a stopwatch. And are you 100% positive you formatted it to be a 1.76mb high density disk? Not an 880kb disk?

Anyway, check to be sure the little switches in the front of the drive are operating correctly. Might need to clean them and the disk drive out with compressed air. The switches in the front may be cleaned with contact cleaner.

Only other thing I can think of is maybe your CIA's and Gary need to be reseated. They're under the power supply harness of course, so try cleaning out your disk drive and re-check all your connections first. One last tidbit I just thought of... was the drive from the 4000 the only one in the system? If it was the 2nd drive, then a jumper may need to be changed in the back of that drive to work as the main drive in your A2000...

Only other thing I can think of is

[rcgrabbag]

OK, I reseated the floppy drive cables and was able to get the A4000 floppy working in the A2000. I am able to format a HD diskette as both 1.44mb and 1.76mb which is interesting. I didn't know Amigas could do that. The A2000 floppy is still toast. I pulled it apart and blew some compressed air through it, at the heads, still the same result. So it looks like my A2000 is functioning normally, but the floppy is toast. It'll make a head thrashing noise when it tries to read the disk, and then display DF0:? and PC0:? for DD disks that are readable by the A4000 floppy. So, assuming (there's that word again) the floppy drive is futzed, what are my options for replacing? Will an HD PC drive work? I have a twisted ribbon in the machine for what it's worth. Oh, and the OS is WB 2.1.

[rkauer]

http://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=30944

[rcgrabbag]

Thanks for the link. Wow, I'm learning a lot. I also found this link after I posted: http://www.freewebs.com/computolio/amiga_floppy_compatibility.html. In the end, I went with one from Amigakit and bought a couple of the Panasonic JU-257A606P mentioned in the link rkauer gave me above. Only $5 from this supplier (today only special): http://www.topmicrousa.com/panasonic-ju-257a606p.html.