Teac floppy help

[mbbrutman]

I have a TEAC FD-55BR which is the standard 360K floppy drive. I like the TEACs because they well built compared to the Qume drives that are standard on PCjrs. (It is direct drive - no stinking belt.)

This particular drive fails diagnostics. The diagnostics say that the diskette is write protected, even though it is not. The drive won't boot DOS from a diskette although it looks like it is going through the motions correctly.

The Qume drives have a mechanical sensor that checks the write protect notch. This TEAC looks like it has an optical sensor. Has anybody ever tried to diagnose and repair one of these things?


Mike

[barryp]

I have a TEAC FD-55BR which is the standard 360K floppy drive. The diagnostics say that the diskette is write protected, even though it is not.

I have one that can be configured to write with no notch and not write if the notch is open. Try covering the write protect notch and see if it works then...

[mbbrutman]

I didn't know the Teac's were configurable that way. It seems like a dangerous option to me. :-)

I'll try it, but I don't think that is the direct problem with the drive. This machine can't boot DOS from this drive, and write protect or not doesn't make a difference on reading.

The write protect error came from the onboard diagnostics. It goes through the motion of writing a pattern out on the disk (or at least looking like it does), then it tries to read the pattern back. As soon as it resets the head to cyl 0 it fails and gives me the 'write protect' error. (Which probably makes the write protect error a red herring.) The failure to read is probably the same thing that keeps it from booting DOS.

I cleaned the drive heads but that did nothing. This drive has a direct drive motor (no belt) so that didn't go wrong. (I like the Teac's because they are direct drive.)

Any other ideas?

[barryp]

I didn't know the Teac's were configurable that way. It seems like a dangerous option to me. :-)

Actually I like it. I use that drive now and then to create an "uneraseable" disk. (I've been known to format the wrong disk, ...)

I'll try it, but I don't think that is the direct problem with the drive.
(I like the Teac's because they are direct drive.)

Any other ideas?

I bought two Teac 55 drives for $160 each, it was long enough ago that that was a great price :shock:

My only other thought is to compare jumper-by-jumper to see if yours has something wrong.