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Sun20 Hard Drive

fri0701

Well-known member
I'm trying to get a Sun20 Hard Drive working in my Lisa 2/10, but I'm having some issues. The drive will spin up, and get to a solid red light (seemingly indicating it's "ready"), but it isn't shown in the boot selection dropdown. If I type Apple-3 to attempt to boot from it, I get an error 85 "drive can't keep up". 

Does anyone have experience with using this drive that can give me a few pointers? I tried to look around for a manual, but couldn't find much.

Thanks!

 

lisa2

Well-known member
Do you have the parallel cable plugged into the par. port on the back of the Lisa?

Many Lisa's with the Sun20 drive have the parallel ribbon cable going out the back of the system to the external par port.  If that is not plugged in, the system will not "see" the HD.

Rick

 

fri0701

Well-known member
Hi Rick,

Thanks for your reply. I'm trying to use this drive with a 2/10, so there is no parallel port on the back of the machine. I was under the assumption that I could use the Widget drive connector in the card cage bay, since I believe that cable is an internal parallel cable on the 2/10. Does that sound correct?

 

lisa2

Well-known member
Yes, on a 2/10 you should be able to use the internal Widget parallel cable.  Be careful, this cable does not have a mark to indicate pin 1 and the connector is not always keyed, so it's easy to connect it backwards.

Rick   

 

fri0701

Well-known member
Is there an easy way to tell which is the correct orientation for the parallel cable? I did notice that the cable doesn't have a notch, so like you said, it's a bit confusing.

When I turn on the Lisa with the drive connected, the drive spins up, the head stepper motor looks like it travels its full range, then the full range back, and then a solid red light comes up on the drive. The drive still doesn't show up as a boot option. If I press Apple-3 to select it anyways, it looks like maybe the stepper motor moves just a hair, and then the Lisa promptly gives an Error 85. 

A couple days ago, this drive gave no sign of life when I plugged it in the same way. I moved the stepper motor by hand just a tiny bit, and it felt like it was stuck in place when I went to do that. After "unsticking" the motor, now the drive will spin up. For a while, it was giving me a "1101" error with its flashing light, which apparently corresponds to a "Seek error during burn-in or recal" error on this model of drive. However, this seems to have cleared up after further use.

 

fri0701

Well-known member
Ah, that clears a lot up! Thanks for the tip.

I tried the drive in my 2/5, using the parallel port connection on the back of the machine and the upper drive connector for power. I get the same results as when testing with the 2/10.

 

superjer2000

Well-known member
Out of curiosity who makes the mechanism for this sun remarketing drive?  Can you take some pictures of it?

 

superjer2000

Well-known member
Thanks!  I love vintage HDs - although the 8425 is new enough that I had a few of the scsi versions over the years. I'd assume the Sun version for the Lisa was MFM?

 

fri0701

Well-known member
Here's some photos of the drive - I wanted to take a video of it spinning up, but my 1.8A Lisa PSU decided to bite the dust today.  :sad:

Time for a re-cap project!

IMG_3587.jpg

IMG_3585.jpg

IMG_3586.jpg

 

MarNo84

Well-known member
Oh beautiful .. a SUN20 :D I really would like to get my hands on such Drive-Kit for my Lisa here ...anyone who would like to get in touch for a trade or so? ;)

 
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