So, today I am erasing a bunch of old floppy disks using the Color Classic. Everything was working fine, having erased about 59 diskettes. Then, one diskette label loosened on the small portion that rolls over to the backside. When this happened, it jammed the floppy drive during ejection. Tried ejecting it a coupleore times, but no change. Manually ejected the diskette using a paper clip, but then found reinserting another diskette would no longer elicit a diskette icon on the desktop. The diskette inserted fine, but that was it. No spin up, no icon, no “eject disk” option under Special menu. I am thinking the jam somehow triggered a software issue that is now responsible for the floppy drive no longer being recognized. If so, what disk repair program would be best to repair? The CC is running OS 7.5.5. Or, do I now have a physical problem with the floppy drive?
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Color Classic no longer recognizes floppy driive
- Thread starter djorud
- Start date
Phipli
Well-known member
There are... three(??) microswitches on the left and right of the floppy opening. Check you haven't broken any
Aah..could very well be. If one or more are indeed broken, are there instructions on this site, or another online source, for removing the floppy drive? It has been a loooong time, maybe late 1990s since I’ve had a CC apart for any reason, so can’t exactly remember how the floppy drive is removed. I presume from the front after removing the front display bezel? Thanks again for the help!
Phipli
Well-known member
I'd usually start with the Service Source.
Macintosh Color Classic Service Source : Apple : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive
Service manual for the Apple Macintosh Color Classic
archive.org
Thanks. Just checked it out and copied to my Notes on iPad. Looks like I’ll be digging deep into the tool chest to find a discharge tool for the CRT. Do you or anyone else here know the whereabout of the service bulletin that describes the discharge steps again? As I recall, the end of the tool is inserted behind the rubber cover on the CRT, but I’m not recalling where the clip is to be connected. I don’t have an antistatic mat anymore. Suggestions welcome on that…
AwkwardPotato
Well-known member
Looking from the back of the machine with the rear bucket off, there's a green wire that goes from the CRT neck board, along the right side of the tube, and hooks onto a piece of metal braid running over the surface of the tube. Hook the clip of the discharge tool onto that braid or onto the metal frame the braid is hooked onto, whichever one the clip fits better on.
Thanks AwkwardPotato, for clarifying where to attach the clip. Removing the floppy drive on the CC is quite a lot more involved that the floppy drive from it’s larger sibling, the LC575, something I just completed a week ago. On the 575, the biggest challenge was removing the very brittle plastic bezel surrounding the CD and floppy drive loading slots. Once removed, access to the drives is elementary. Whoever designed the Color Classic with one piece front apparently was more concerned about a sleeker appearing front than the more easily accessed and serviceable sub-bezel incorporated into the LC575. The evolution of the early Macs is rather fascinating.
Scott Baret
Well-known member
The CC, 500 series, and an unreleased intermediate model were actually all designed at the same time (AppleDesign mentions this and is my source here). The intermediate model is a little hard to describe but looks like a short, somewhat compressed 500 series. There's a pic in AppleDesign.
I get a feeling the CC was intentionally designed the way it was because of its size and the fact it had to stay somewhat true to the B&W Classic line, seeing that it was really just an evolution of it in a sense. The analog probably is what it is because of the screen used; seeing that it couldn't go any other way, it had to be designed the way it was.
Good to know about the floppy drive being more accessible than thought...do any screws need removed for that? I've got a Color Classic with a floppy that won't stay in the "up" position and have a drive ready to go to stick inside it...just need to do it (not exactly a repair I'm looking forward to).
I get a feeling the CC was intentionally designed the way it was because of its size and the fact it had to stay somewhat true to the B&W Classic line, seeing that it was really just an evolution of it in a sense. The analog probably is what it is because of the screen used; seeing that it couldn't go any other way, it had to be designed the way it was.
Good to know about the floppy drive being more accessible than thought...do any screws need removed for that? I've got a Color Classic with a floppy that won't stay in the "up" position and have a drive ready to go to stick inside it...just need to do it (not exactly a repair I'm looking forward to).
Scott,
With the holidays now upon us, my attention to the CC floppy drive replacement will now be delayed until after New Years. As you have yours out already, may I ask what model floppy drive is used in the CC? I have a month or more to search for one prior to actual repair day, so may as well spend the time getting prepared…
With the holidays now upon us, my attention to the CC floppy drive replacement will now be delayed until after New Years. As you have yours out already, may I ask what model floppy drive is used in the CC? I have a month or more to search for one prior to actual repair day, so may as well spend the time getting prepared…
This morning, the replacement floppy drive came, a Sony MP-F75W-11G. The original was an MP-F75W-01G. So, after following directions for removal as recommended above, the old floppy drive came out fine. The replacement drive installed without any problems, as the drive is physically identical as far as I can tell. Once installed, I inserted a Mac formatted floppy. The auto-load worked fine. Ten seconds later, NO floppy disk icon shows up on the desktop, but instead, a pop-up “this diskette is unreadable, do you want to initialize it?” Alright, sure…clicked on initialize button, after which I get the following pop-up “initializing will erase the contents of the diskette. do you wish to proceed?”. Certainly…Clicked on “Initialize” and it began to erase. Just as it was about to finish verifying the diskette, I get the following message (paraphrased),”Initializing failed, likely due to a damaged diskette”. Okay…let’s try another diskette. Same thing happened. Inserted several more diskettes, and the same “damaged diskette” message is displayed after spending nearly a minute erasing. So, I am deducing that the diiskettes are not the issue. It’s the replacement drive not operating as it should, perhaps a software issue?
So, this floppy drive came from an LC III and was reported to be working. Do I need to reload the operating system (7.5.5) to correct this issue? Or is there another issue here that I am overlooking?
So, this floppy drive came from an LC III and was reported to be working. Do I need to reload the operating system (7.5.5) to correct this issue? Or is there another issue here that I am overlooking?
Thanks for the suggestion to get a head cleaning kit. Just ordered one. Never having had a problem like this before, although that would be a very long time ago, and with the disk seeming to spin up fine, the problem seems limited to a reading issue. Cleaning would sure be a simple solution if it works. Will post in a few days after it arrives and I’ve had time to use it.
The head cleaning kit arrived and was finally able to clean the floppy drive today. No change at all. Same “This disk is unreadable by this Macintosh. Do you want to initialize the disk?” message as before. Interestingly, I used Tech Tool Pro to clean the floppy drive, and it worked perfectly for the first cleaning. But, when I tried to immediately repeat the cleaning process, Tech Tool Pro allows me to issue the “Clean” command, but then the window wihich should be showing a depiction of the drive head being cleaned would instead abort the cleaning process. Tried repeatedly and the same thing….the cleaning is immediately aborted. Here’s the odd part; wait ten minutes and then try cleaning again, and it worked perfectly. Try to do an immediate followup cleaning and it aborted as before.
To double check if there is a problem with the cleaning disk, I went to two other old Macs I have with floppy drives and was able to clean them without problem, repeatedly.
Tomorrow, I will remove the logic board and substitute another working board in its place to see if it makes any difference. If it does, then we know it’s a board issue. Will report back then….
To double check if there is a problem with the cleaning disk, I went to two other old Macs I have with floppy drives and was able to clean them without problem, repeatedly.
Tomorrow, I will remove the logic board and substitute another working board in its place to see if it makes any difference. If it does, then we know it’s a board issue. Will report back then….
Chopsticks
Well-known member
fwiw those disk cleaning kits don't always work. usually they are fine but if there's any dirt or anything backed onto the heads then a cleaning kit won't work. usually I use a bit of dish washing detergent on a q-tip followed by some IPA on another q-tip, I've found that manually cleaning the head this way is much more sucessfull (I've cleaning/repaired etc at least 40-50 Mac floppy drives over the years and that is just what worked best for me.
two drives not working in a row isn't as common but its not surprising either due to the ages of these things. like you said try another logic board or even connect the 2 floppy drives to another Mac and see fi there's any change or not in the symptoms. this would allow you to determine if its the floppy drives or the floppy controller etc on the logic board.
two drives not working in a row isn't as common but its not surprising either due to the ages of these things. like you said try another logic board or even connect the 2 floppy drives to another Mac and see fi there's any change or not in the symptoms. this would allow you to determine if its the floppy drives or the floppy controller etc on the logic board.
Thanks for the cleaning suggestions. Will resort to them if a need to remove the drive again is necessary. Now that we are suspicious of the logic board, there is an existing logic board issue regarding the startup chime, that being it doesn’t chime on startup. This isn’t a new issue. It was present before the floppy drive problems. I know for a fact the chime issue is logic board related, as I did switch out the logic board with another known working board on another Color Classic I have here, and it actually did resolve he chime issue, meaning the chime did work when a different logic board was substituted for the original. My plan today is to make the same change once again, switching out the suspect board with one that is known to work fine. As to why the chime hasn’t been working, but everything else was fine (with the possible exception of the newly emerged floppy drive problems), I don’t have the knowledge about how it is constructed to make any guesses. I’ll. leave that to the real experts who frequent this forum.
If the logic board switch identifies the problem, I do have some other logic boards here that could be inserted after testing and probably recapping, so there is light at the end of the tunnel hopefully. One is from an LC550, which offers provisions for expanding RAM, making it the best choice should it not have any problems of its own.
If the logic board switch identifies the problem, I do have some other logic boards here that could be inserted after testing and probably recapping, so there is light at the end of the tunnel hopefully. One is from an LC550, which offers provisions for expanding RAM, making it the best choice should it not have any problems of its own.
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