model 4 external drives

[daafies]

hi all, i attached my HxC to my model4 and its acting as drive 1 and 2. now i tried hooking up the old internal ones to the external port for testing, but it's not being recognized by trsdos. in basic i can do "out 244,3" and the drive spins up. am i forgetting something?

 

thanks

david

 

[Turbo-Torch]

Are they full height Tandon drives? At the rear of the drive's pcb, look for a 16 pin socket with a jumper pack plugged into it. The drive designation depends on what tabs are cut. You'll need to configure them for #3 and #4. I think the last drive may also require a terminating resistor pack.

 

If you have newer drives, you may just have simple jumper blocks that need to be configured for #3 and #4.

Edited July 23, 2015 by Turbo-Torch

[daafies]

thanks let me check. not sure what models they are.

[Turbo-Torch]

I know the 4D had DS drives vs. all the older models having SS (original from Radio Shack). I have DS in my Model III but they are nearly identical to the SS except for the second head. 4D drives have a different style front face which makes me think they are a different brand. Either way, there has to be an obvious way to configure them.

Definitely be cool to keep them functioning with the HxC.

[daafies]

here's a pic of the board. i couldnt find a brand/model :/ i talked to Ian Mavric and he suggested adding a terminator, however that also did not help. i might need a new FDC.

 

but for now i am OK with just running the HxC as internal drives 0 and 1. who wants to use floppy's nowadays anyway

 

 

[Turbo-Torch]

I'm not familiar with that board...it might be a Texas Peripherals drive?

 

Look at the bottom right of the photo near the edge connector. See the numbers 1 2 3 4?

 

I'm thinking things can go two ways here.

 

Radio Shack sometimes selected drives by deleting certain pins in the floppy drive connector. Look at your cable and see if any pins are missing, especially any that match up to those numbers on the board. I'm guessing you may have some pins missing.

If so, you'll need to reconfigure the cable or get a new one.

 

If all the connectors/pins are there, it may be a simple matter of cutting the proper trace or traces between those 8 pads labeled 1 2 3 4.

 

The two internal drives on TRS-80s didn't use a terminating resistor; however, the last external drive is supposed to have one.

 

Personally, I'd get them up and running. Every vintage computer needs 5¼" floppies and the only thing cooler would be an 8" floppy!

[+sm3]

...

Personally, I'd get them up and running. Every vintage computer needs 5¼" floppies and the only thing cooler would be an 8" floppy!

 

I agree, even though I mainly use hard disk emulators like the FreHD or MISE for my Model1/4 it is cool to be able to use a real floppy still!