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IBM 4869 External 5 1/4 Drive Question

T

Teufelhunden

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NJ, USA
I have an IBM 4869 drive (* 360 KB) that I was using in my "tweener" but I recently found a replacement internal drive. I put the 4869 back into its enclosure and now I would like to use it as an external drive in one of my other computers. Does anyone know the model number of the legacy disk controller card (or cards if there is more than one model) that I would need? Does it come in a PCI version or just ISA and do they only work in 8-bit machines? I can use either but PCI would be more convenient if it exists. The drive and enclosure are in nice shape so I would like to keep it original and not mod it. Thank you!
 
Some boards that were intended for that floppy enclosure are microchannel. http://ps-2.kev009.com/ohlandl/floppy/5_25-Floppy.html shows the various boards.
There is also a Personal System/2 5.25 Inch External Diskette Drive Adapter which is mentioned in documentation for the Model 30 286. So either 8-bit or 16-bit ISA probably 8-bit since there is a 5.25" external 360kB drive for the 8-bit Model 25 and 30.
Nope, not PCI.
The cards are supposed to be simple passing cable signals from the planar board floppy controller, redirecting them outside, and into the enclosure. No real logic involved. I can't find any homebrew cabling setups but it should be possible to use the drive with any other standard floppy controller. You just need find the special pinouts and create a proper set of adapters and cables.
 
Thank you guys for the info. Google searches turn up nothing useful except for a few links to these forums, so I just wanted to say thanks and that I really appreciate this site.

Krebizfan, thank you for that link,it has very useful info. I suppose this card (which I found thanks to your link) can only be used in an 8 or 16 bit system? I only have available ISA slots in a PII 400, Win 98 SE machine.

Chuck, I had already looked at your adaption blog (very cool!) and I was thinking that if they is no plug and play option I can make an adapter for between the cable and a card instead of modding the internal cable. Do you know of a cheap card I can use with this? You mentioned it works with a Compaticard but after some research I think that is out of my reach. I guess I will use it with my PII ISA since PCI won't work. I also don't want to use my 5150 since I don't need a third drive on it.

Please forgive my ignorance as I'm just learning how this stuff works.
 
I think the EBay offering is incorrectly labeled. It is a Microchannel card. I haven't found any online link to the ISA version of these cards. I had an MCA version but not the ISA so I can't be sure what the ISA card looks like.
 
The ISA card, IIRC, wasn't so much an FDC as something daisy-chained onto the floppy connector that took added the missing drive motor and drive select bits (both write-only registers).

Take a look at the XT-FDC--that has external drive connectors as well.
 
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