Escom a1200 FDD swap

[Linchpin]

My escom a1200 has not got a standard FDD in it as you all proberbly know, its got a panasonic drive. I beleve that this drive is capable of reading HD floppies, but can the amiga read HD floppies with this drive or am i still limited to the old 770k variation. If it can only read 770K disks, i have an old a500 drive at home, maybe i can swap them over? Any advice appriciated.

--EDIT--

The reason i would change is that the escom drive is known to have difficulty reading old software.

[amigamad]

The reason i would change is that the escom drive is known to have difficulty reading old software.

I think it was only if you used high density  disk instead of double density i remember the fix to use high density disk is to cover the extra hole on the disc the one the other side of the write protect tab . :-)

[Linchpin]

Yeah, i knew about that.

How much data can my amiga read/write from these disks then?

Cheers.

[alx]

How much data can my amiga read/write from these disks then?

I've got the C= A1200, but with a high density drive fitted.  It won't read high density disks, and if you cover the hole then it treats them as double-density (no extra capacity).  I don't think that the A1200 floppy controller can read high density disks, but I'm not sure.

[PulsatingQuasar]

If i remember correctly, there is a driver/device on Aminet that allows you to format 1,44 MB in Amiga format on those diskdrives.

Don't know if it's save or if it can format PC too. Or if I remember correctly.

[fragment]

alx wrote:

I don't think that the A1200 floppy controller can read high density disks, but I'm not sure.

Found this on aminet :-)

http://www.aminet.net/hard/hack/HiDensity.lha

[alx]

Found this on aminet :-)

I never knew that was there - thanks :-D  I'm downloading it now - I'll tell you all how it works.

[Ni72ous]

the HiDensity archive on the aminet will only let you store 1.44mb pc size disks not 1.76 amiga size disks

[Mad-Matt]

In order to write Amiga HD floppies you need a specific Amiga HDFloppy drive.  Those pc ones do not read/write Amiga format HD floppy disks.

However there is the driver on Aminet but dont expect to be able to read ya data back after youve madee a disk in its format. Its a software hack and not very relighable at all.

When these models of Amigas were made, the motherboard itself was hacked to accomodate the panasonic drive and in doing so removed the drive ready signal which nearly all amiga games need

There is another hack to add a reset signal to the drive if you want to on Aminet although i dont have the name of it right now ...it is there.

I my self use a normal A1200 and hacked my drive cable to occomodate the panasonic drive which i got from an unhappy new amiga owner (since my amiga one died and i was too much of a cheapskate to buy a proper miggy drive).  Although theres no info on aminet on how to do this, i dod down laod all the info i could and put it together to make my solution.

When i got my power tower it came with a propper face plate for the panasonic miggy drives which was nice as i get a drive led too

matt
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[Linchpin]

Yeah, theres some mini board thing that the fdd plugs into and then goes into the mobo.

i will prolly just change the drives, its easier :-)