A3000 floppy mystery

[weirdami]

I have some internal 3 1/2" floppy drives and I'd like to determine if they're from an A3000. Are there any sort of tell-tale signs that distinguish A3000 floppy drives from, say, non-Amiga floppy drives? I don't have a working A3000 to put these into, so I'll have to be an external inspection of the drives. Just need to know what to look for.

Did A3000UX's have different sorts of floppy drives than A3000's? That info would be helpful, too.

[MrZammler]

Well, they should not have the front bezel, and there should be a slightly bigger eject button than usuall.

Other than that, I dont have my A3000 open right now, but I could tell you if there are any stickers or model number on it.

UX's floppy's should be tha same as in the standard A3000 (which btw had no real differences, anyway)

[Matt_H]

There's a label on the back of the drives. That, along with the physical descrption given, should identify the drives for you:

Look out for Chinon FZ-357 or FZ-354. Not sure if those are the exact numbers, but it should be enough to go by.

[Castellen]

A majority of all the A3000s I've worked on have had a Chinon FB-357A fitted.

If it's a FZ-357, then it's your lucky day, as that's the special high density drive which are quite hard to get, therefore expensive. :-)

[x56h34]

Mine has a FB-357A and it's high density.

[Castellen]

Sorry, you're right.  The FB and FZ-357 are high density drives.
It was the FB-354 commonly shipped with A3000s.

[Jagabot]

Are you sure about the FZ-357 being a high density drive? I have a couple here, I assumed they where "full height" 880k drives as I also have installed FZ-357A and FB-357A drives which are high density for sure (just one is a taller drive). The FZ-357 drives I have include white bezels and a white eject button instead of the longer tan (and angled) eject button on a non-bezel 3000T drive.

[Castellen]

Yep, I was referring to the FZ-357A which is definately high density, as is the FB-357A (I'm watching one right now read a high density disk :-)).

As I recall, the FZ-357A came (only?) in the slim variety, and I suspect the FB-357A was full height only, as is the double density FB-354.
There may have been full height FZ-357A drives at one point?  Thought I had one among my spare parts, but can't find it.

I guess there must be a big list explaining all these confusing model numbers somewhere.  Does anyone know of one??

[weirdami]

Hey, thanks guys! :-D

I determined that I have 2 FB-354's. One's REV D, the other REV E. (There's about 20 million between the serial numbers.)

These things have huge eject buttons! 3 inches wide, they are! :-? Now, I just need to find a place to get the little white dealy that pokes out of the front of the case and connects to the eject button inside.

What's a bezel? Is that the front cover? These don't have those, I'm guessing because the A3000 case acts as the front cover.

Would I be able to test these things in an A1200, A500, or A1000? I still have to figure out my my A3000 motherboard is cheesed. WIll a missing battery cause yellow and gray bootup colors?

[jeffimix]

Missing battery should cause no issues, my 2000 has no battery. I assume 3000 is same?

Oh and BTW, about those expensive HD drives? Get a catweasel.

[tonyw]

No, a missing battery will only stop it from keeping the right time when you switch it off. It won't affect anything else.

tony

[weirdami]

I guess I'll just have to either sell this puppy or dig out some electronics testing gizmos and teach myself electronics repair. :-)

How much are broken A3000 motherboards going for these days, anyway?

[Effy]

You probably tried it already but in case you didn´t, disconnect as much as you can and try to boot up again, no harddrive, no floppy, minimum of memory, no expansion cards ...

[weirdami]

@effy

All that was connected when I got the colors was the monitor and the power supply. I didn't connect anythig else.