Apple 400k drive always ejects !

[Moofo]

Hi there.

I'm testing some of my external 400k drives. Some of them have a perculiar problem which is completely the opposite of most of these drives: When you insert a floppy, it mounts, then it ejects. They greyed out disk icon remains on the desktop. If I reinsert the floppy, the disk icon revert to a mounted state but the drives ejects almost instantly.

I'm using an SE with 800 k drive to test.

The drives are specifically Sony OA-D34V-22. Anyone came across that problem ?

 

[Mac128]

Nope. You got me. Here's a check list:

Is this an FDHD or upgraded SE?

What OS are you running on the SE?

Are the disks locked?

Do the disks work properly on the internal drive?

Do you have another external drive to test on the SE?

Do you have another compact to test the 400K drives on? (we need to rule out the SE)

OA-D34V-22 is the latest 400K drive mechanism, which should work fine with an SE. If this were an original 64K ROM, I might wonder if it wasn't an incompatibility with the ROM and later eject mechanism. But the latest ROM code should be in the SE.

Pina suggests one problem might be a bad external floppy filter, but if other external drives work, then that's not the issue.

This is really an odd one. It's in long enough to mount, but immediately ejects. What triggers the ejection mechanism on a 400K? Hmmm. Is the SE otherwise fully functional? No sticky mouse or keys?

When you look inside them, do you see two red LEDs, or just one?

 

[Moofo]

Is this an FDHD or upgraded SE? No, it's a plain vanilla SE with 20 Mb Miniscribe and 4 Mb ram.

What OS are you running on the SE? 6.08 I think

Are the disks locked? No

Do the disks work properly on the internal drive? Yes

Do you have another external drive to test on the SE?: Many, they work fine

Do you have another compact to test the 400K drives on? (we need to rule out the SE): I think so. I have some SE/30 but they might not work properly for that. I **Think*** I have one 512k Left.

Finally, they are Sony OA-D34V. Not Sony OA-D34V-22. if the -22 is the most recent one, it's odd since many ejector parts are plastic on the OA-D34V. The other working 400k drives (OA-D34V-22) have are 100 % metal ejector parts. I can send you pics.

Is there any cabling difference between internal and external drives ? Because the drives might come from 512 or 128 k macs... I remember that one pin was left unconnected in the internal ribbons of 128 and 512k macs...

 

[Mac128]

The original Sony drives should work fine with the Rev. B ROM upgrade and up. Check your drive against this tech note. Confirm which yours is. Based on Apple's description, I would imagine that the later drives were not always labeled properly.

The key now is to test your drive on another Mac. It does sound like the SE should otherwise function properly with the 400K, but you never know. There could also be something going on in the 6.0.8 System. Is it a clean System?

A 400K drive will not work on an SE 30. Don't plug it into any SWIM-based Mac.

The cabling only applies to internal drives, and only some 800K drives at that. External drives are already configured properly.