Can't find HD? Insert disk icon

[t1200]

I received my grandfather's Commodore A1200 Amiga. I have fond memories from my childhood on this computer. But when I tried to turn it on, it just repeats an animation of inserting a floppy disk. I don't think it can read the hard drive. What can I do?

I don't know how to troubleshoot these types of computers.

[ElPolloDiabl]

First open it up and check it is seated right.
Otherwise there is a way to change the boot delay, but I can't remember. Someone else will help. In the meantime search for: A1200 + Hard drive on this forum.

[Boot_WB]

I received my grandfather's Commodore A1200 Amiga.

God, I feel old all of a sudden.

[meega]

Does it even have a hard drive? Can you hear whirry noises from under the left-centre of the machine?

Before opening it up, try rebooting by giving it the three-fingered salute (press Ctrl-Amiga-Amiga, the big A keys either side of the space bar). If the hard drive is slow to get spun up from power-on then this may get things going.

[Boot_WB]

I received my grandfather's Commodore A1200 Amiga. I have fond memories from my childhood on this computer. But when I tried to turn it on, it just repeats an animation of inserting a floppy disk. I don't think it can read the hard drive. What can I do?

I don't know how to troubleshoot these types of computers.

On the Amiga A1200 a hard drive was an optional add-on (We're talking an era before most computers had hard drives at all). It may be that your Amiga does not have one installed.

If this is the case, then you will need to load any software from floppy disk (hence the insert disk animation).

If you wish to determine if there is a hard drive, you can remove the screws from the underside of the case (around 8 screws from memory), and lift off the top half of the case. The hard-drive (if present) will be located in a caddy towards the top left corner of the case, partly underneath the keyboard (if memory serves).

The hard drive type will most likely be* a 2.5" (standard laptop size) PATA drive, which is powered from the motherboard via the 44-pin ribbon connector cable (40-pins standard PATA + 4 pins +5V/Gnd).
(* There are hacks to connect a 3.5" drive internally, but they are a bit messy imho, and a standard 2.5" drive is far more likely)

Let us know if there is/isn't a hard drive present, and we'll do our best to help you fire up your Grandfather's treasured system from there.

All the best, welcome to Amiga.org, and sorry to hear (for whatever reason) that your Grandfather has had to pass on his system.



Rich

[t1200]

Does it even have a hard drive? Can you hear whirry noises from under the left-centre of the machine?

Before opening it up, try rebooting by giving it the three-fingered salute (press Ctrl-Amiga-Amiga, the big A keys either side of the space bar). If the hard drive is slow to get spun up from power-on then this may get things going.

Yes, I hear a muffled machine gun sound from the left side, then the floppy lights up and makes noise, then the animation.

Rebooting it with the keyboard just repeats this process.

On the Amiga A1200 a hard drive was an optional  add-on (We're talking an era before most computers had hard drives at  all). It may be that your Amiga does not have one installed.

If this is the case, then you will need to load any software from floppy  disk (hence the insert disk animation).

If you wish to determine if there is a hard drive, you can remove the  screws from the underside of the case (around 8 screws from memory), and  lift off the top half of the case. The hard-drive (if present) will be  located in a caddy towards the top left corner of the case, partly  underneath the keyboard (if memory serves).

The hard drive type will most likely be* a 2.5" (standard laptop size)  PATA drive, which is powered from the motherboard via the 44-pin ribbon  connector cable (40-pins standard PATA + 4 pins +5V/Gnd).
(* There are hacks to connect a 3.5" drive internally, but they are a  bit messy imho, and a standard 2.5" drive is far more likely)

Let us know if there is/isn't a hard drive present, and we'll do our  best to help you fire up your Grandfather's treasured system from there.

All the best, welcome to Amiga.org, and sorry to hear (for whatever  reason) that your Grandfather has had to pass on his system.



Rich

Thanks. Papa is in failing health and wants to give his family mementos now instead of waiting for a legal will.

I was able to take the case off and pull out the hard drive. My plan is to connect it to my desktop and make an image of it, if possible. I burned System Rescue CD and plan to use ddrescue to make an image. Then I would use an emulator to pull files off the image. Does that sound like a good plan?

I flipped it over to start.


I removed all the screws.


I removed some panels.


I flipped it rightside up. The top part is almost off.


I turned the top sideways and flipped the keyboard upside down. The hard drive is just sitting there.


I took out the hard drive and put the pieces back in place.


It says Conner CP2088.

[Cammy]

I don't know much about making images of foreign filesystems on a PC but your plan may work, but it should also work directly through the emulator if the PC can even spin the drive up. To me it sounds like the problem is the drive is having trouble spinning up. These old hard drives tend to develop this problem as they age, and I have found that gently flicking the top of the drive with my finger while the Amiga is just starting up can make the drive start to spin properly. Think of an Amiga like the Millenium Falcon, sometimes you have to hit it a bit to get it to work, but it's so full of character and secrets that you'll love it forever.

Regardless of if you can get the old drive to boot or back up, you really shouldn't continue using the same old drive in the Amiga after this. These days there's no better option than a cheap IDE-CF adapter with a 4GB Compact Flash card instead of a hard drive. It's basically a solid-state drive so it boots faster and uses less power than a hard drive, and they're silent.

I'm not sure where you're from or what your budget is, but these few things shouldn't be too hard for you to get ahold of. It would really help if someone could send you a CF card with Workbench (and preferably ClassicWB or AmigaSYS installed on there also) so you could get started straight away, or at least send you a bootable floppy disk to start writing your own disks or installing things on your own drive.

I guess if you let us know where abouts you are from (or list it in your profile) we can help you with some links to local dealers or users where you can get what you need.

[t1200]

Sorry for the late reply. I'm waiting to get at my desktop and will test out that hard drive next weekend.

Meanwhile I found an old CF card and adapter I had laying around. It's a Viking 512MB and an Addonics adapter. I plugged them in and put the case back on. I found the Amiga install floppy and booted it. It didn't exactly work.

I ran the installer. It went OK until it complained that Install3.0 is write-protected. Well I don't want to write to that volume, that's the floppy!

I ran HDSetup and entered '0' for the hard drive type. It gave the error: Sorry... an Error Has Occured! LOL they need spell check in 1992. Could not partition this hard drive! I exited and did it again, with '6' this time. I got the same error.

So I quit the tool and ran HDToolBox. It had one drive listed, which was listed as SCSI, Address 0, LUN 0, Status Unknown. All the options were greyed-out except Change Drive Type. I clicked it and it had a preset for the old drive: Conner Peripherals 84MB 2.37, and it was under the SCSI type, not XT. Then I chose to define a new drive. I clicked Read Configuration and it gave the error Unit is not a disk (type 7)! Yet it correctly read the number of heads, sectors, cylinders. I clicked Ok and it gave the error Install3.0 is write-protected.

Now I am at a loss.

[A4000_Mad]

It's been a while but I would suggest that you go through the installation procedure again with your Install3.0 floppy write-enabled. If I recall correctly a file is indeed written to the floppy disk containing information about the hard drive being set up. I think the file is called 'drive_definitions' or something like that. Anyway, no harm in trying. Good luck!


.

[Franko]

In HDToolbox, you simply have to redirect the drive definitions to RAM: if you don't want to write to the floppy when setting things up in this way.

[Tenacious]

So I quit the tool and ran HDToolBox. It had one drive listed, which was listed as SCSI, Address 0, LUN 0, Status Unknown.

Did you try running the machine without the CF adapter?  Do you have other software on floppy?  What do you think?

One of the strange things (I suppose there are a few) in Amiga's OS is HDToolBox lists all hard drives as SCSI, even when they are obviously IDE.  I think it is a quirk in the rom.  You should not worry about this, simply pretend it's right and continue partitioning and formating.

IIRC, not all CF cards and adaptors are compatible with the older Amiga IDE interface.  Others here can spell out the incompatibilities.

Welcome to Amiga!  You have been given a unique system, even by today's standards.  Err, especially by today's standards, the more computers evolve the more the hardware and OSes look the same and copy each other.  Progress, right?

[Amiduffer]

Be sure to look in the tutorials section of this website. There is a very good tutorial there about the proper steps to installing Workbench on your 1200.

Sounds like that old HD is toast.