Floppy drive issue

[juanmas]

Hello again,

I’m restoring a Macintosh SE using parts. Once the Macintosh boots up and everything is ok is time to install a SO but the floppy doesn’t want to read any floppy. I’ve cleaned the unit and seems to work fine, floppies get in and out smoothly but no OS is loaded. I’m using 1,44 MBytes floppies and the floppy drive is a 2 MBytes unit. But, I’m not quite sure the motherboard was collected from a FDHD or a dual 800KB. Does the dual 800KB floppy drives supports 1,44MB drives?

Two or three times the Mac has tried to load the SO from the floppy but after 20 seconds it refuses the floppy. It happens always when I turn on the Macintosh with the floppy inside.

Could it it be a problem related with the floppy’s head alignment?

Thanks!!

 

[Dog Cow]

"Does the dual 800KB floppy drives supports 1,44MB drives?"

No.

The Mac SE needs a ROM upgrade and SuperDrive to use 1.44MB HD floppies.

 

[sstaylor]

And if I recall correctly, it also needs a SWIM chip for the HD upgrade.

 

[juanmas]

Thanks for reply,

Finally I took another floppy drive from a LCII and it worked so I guess something is wrong with that drive. But when I put the bad drive on the LCII it worked... I’ve swaped one for another and fine!!

Regards!

 

[The MAC MANIAC!]

These old drives always fail! A result of the mix of moving and electrical parts. They break really easy over time.