classic not all is well

[bluekatt]

my macintosh classic (christend big blue after the code name for the G3 ) is running system 6

and its having trouble reading disks not just windows floppies but also 800 k macintosh floppies 1,44 floppies formatted under 7 and 9.1

is this a system 6 problem or is the floppy drive on its way out ?

if its just system 6 its all the more reason to get rid off it

 

[Quadraman]

my macintosh classic (christend big blue after the code name for the G3 ) is running system 6 and its having trouble reading disks not just windows floppies but also 800 k macintosh floppies 1,44 floppies formatted under 7 and 9.1

is this a system 6 problem or is the floppy drive on its way out ?

if its just system 6 its all the more reason to get rid off it

I would try downloading a newer OS from Apple and testing it to see if that's the problem. If it still has trouble reading, I think you will know it is most likely a hardware problem.

 

[bluekatt]

i was thinking of getting 7.3.5 from apple but then i have to put it from my imac G5 to one fo my macs which actually has a floppy drive scrounge up 19 floppies and then pray it works

which sounds like bit too much trouble too me

thankfully i am expecting a color classic with a system 7.1 set of floppies

 

[II2II]

Do you have an "intermediary" mac that has a LocalTalk port, or an ethernet interface for your Classic? If so, try a network install.

You could also try installing 7.0, then grab the appropriate extension from from 7.5.5. That will be many fewer floppies.

Another problem with those drives is dust, so it may just need a good cleaning. (The fans push air out of the case, which means air must flow in somewhere else. The floppy drive is one of the places that air can come into the system, to it tends to have a lot of dust coming in with that air.)

 

[gobabushka]

it sounds like to me tht you have a bad floppy drive

 

[Bolle]

i would also say that its a bad floppy drive. my experiences show that system 7 and above are more picky about floppys than system 6 so that shouldn be your problem.

 

[equill]

If you can initialize a floppy disk, write to it it and then read from it all on the same Mac (Classic), the mechanism is all right. If that same floppy disk cannot be read in the FDD of another Mac (Colour Classic), it is probable that the alignment of the floppy drive that made the diskette is faulty. Terminal.

If a floppy disk made on another Mac (CC) cannot be recognized as one by the FDD of the Mac in question (Classic), and you do not suspect the drive of the other Mac, you may have either a dirty drive to clean or a dead drive to replace. Similarly if you get read errors, as long as you are sure of the goodness of the floppy disk.

You don't need 19 floppies to install System 7.5.3 (and another few for the update to 7.5.5, which is overkill for a RAM-starved Classic). What you need is one folder on the desktop of the Classic with the 19 files (one .img and 18 parts) together in that folder. This you can achieve with one floppy disk and a working drive. My own opinion is that 7.5 is as far as you can comfortably go with only 4MB of RAM max. and 8MHz.

However, he who has ethernet has no need for floppies. The G5 and the CC can talk via a crossover ethernet cable, even if the G5 is running Tiger. Make Tiger the server, and talk over TCP/IP. Make the floppies on the CC, if you can, and if the Classic can read them, that will work. With a LocalTalk/SCSI adapter, or better, an EN/SC adapter (ethernet to SCSI), the Classic can talk dirty over ethernet to the CC, and thereby avoid the intervention of floppies into the cosy relationship. Lastly, given the scarcity of something/SCSI adapters, the Classic and CC can exchange files directly over LocalTalk through their serial ports. Much cheaper, but slower than ethernet. But it will be far in advance of anything that you can achieve by banging your head on a wall over floppy drives.

de

 

[bluekatt]

the floppy drive is fine

it took my ystem 7.1 discs claris works discs and floppies formatted from the classic just fine

how ever the classic choked on the 7.1 install and gave me twice the same error

quite frankly tis machine is starting to get on my nerves i have had it for five years and lets say we never got on well

 

[tomlee59]

Actually, it's too early to declare that your floppy is fine. For example, if the alignment is a bit off, it may still read certain disks ok (because those may have been written by a drive with an error, too, but smaller than yours). But if you try to read a floppy written by a drive with an error in the other direction, you may not be able to read it reliably.

Dirty heads can also produce or contribute to this problem. Since it's easier to clean than to align, first try a good clean and see if things get better.

 

[bluekatt]

i would say that i would not be surprised if it was dirt but it has always been doing that