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Stuck with this Color Classic Floppy Issue.

Mastergeko4

Active member
About a year or two ago, I purchased a dead Macintosh Color Classic from eBay as a new project system to fix up and keep in my collection.
As of now, everything on the computer works with no issues besides one thing, the floppy drive. I've already cleaned and lubed the drive and it should work fine, but it doesn't. I've actually gone as far as to try it in other systems and the drive itself reads and ejects perfectly in every system I tried, besides this particular Color Classic.
Before you say something, yes, the first thing I did was recap the LogicBoard with some fresh new Tanatalums. I even recently removed all the caps to check for any broken traces on the logic board I may have missed, however, I'm 90% sure I didn't see anything suspicious.
So what could be causing this phenomenon? It's a working drive that should work but it doesn't. Where should I start troubleshooting?
 

jessenator

Well-known member
Since it appears the drive itself is not suspect:

I would look at the pins on the board floppy connector, in the off-chance they have cold solder joints, or are otherwise tarnished or would give an intermittent or weak signal.

You're using the same ribbon to test the drive in other systems, I assume? If not, I'd check each contact on the ColorClassic's ribbon for continuity if you have a tool for that and/or try a different ribbon in case there are broken wires/connector.

Good luck!
 

jessenator

Well-known member
Oh, my apologies... The color classic has an edge connector for everything internal. That makes things a bit more complicated, but not impossible. Sorry, I had "Classic" in my head and immediately assumed it was that model...

I would first clean the edge connector on both ends with 90%+ isopropyl alcohol as carefully as possible, see if that clears things up. If that doesn't work, it'll be a chore, but doable to check continuity from the floppy drive connector to whichever pin corresponds on the edge connector.

I'm not a Color Classic expert, but it will likely involve opening up and doing some partial disassembly of the unit. There might be some YouTube videos or even possibly a guide on iFixit (I don't know how far back they go). Another option would be the service manual: https://cdn.preterhuman.net/texts/computing/Apple_Service_PDF/68k_Macintosh/color_classic.pdf

There might be some other troubleshooting ideas in there as well.

Take extreme care when dealing with a CRT. I'd look up a video tutorial on how to properly discharge one, as I'd likely leave something out (replying on mobile)
 

Mastergeko4

Active member
Thanks for the reply!
I'm quite familiar with the Color Classic disassembly and the discharge of the CRT, so no problems there.
I find it funny that this is the first time cleaning the connector dawned on me, so I gave it a shot with a toothbrush and some denatured.
Unfortunately, it still doesn't seem to work. I've been trying to probe the connection with my multimeter to check continuity but the angle and placement of everything couldn't be more inconvenient. I also tried another known working floppy drive, but that didn't seem to work either.
(Pardon me for the late reply, I think the site was down again.)
 
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