Chinon FZ-357A 3.5" Floppy Drive (for my Amiga)

[Raven]

Title says it all, really. My drive has a wonky power connector that cuts out and forces the Amiga to turn off if jostled - not really acceptable. Trying to find a FZ-357A because why not have an HD drive if I'm going to replace it anyway.. but I can't find one.

 

[Chuck(G)]

Forgive a stupid question, but why not simply repair the drive? A dab of Gorilla Glue will secure the connector and then you can patch any cracked traces around the connector if necessary.

 

[Unknown_K]

Amiga floppy drives are getting hard to find and not exactly cheap, I would repair the one you have. The model you listed is the rare HD drive found in A4000's and people pay a bunch for them. The stock drive for the A1200 is DD.

 

[MikeS]

Any idea what the "A" in FZ-357A stands for?

 

[Raven]

The ones on eBay don't go for more than $40, and those are mostly being shipped from EU..

The one I have isn't *broken*, but it cuts out.. suddenly Amiga won't boot - what can I do? Open it and move the connector slightly, push on it, then it works.. My first thought was replace the cable, but that didn't help.

There's no apparent damage, it just randomly makes the machine not boot, but if I disconnect the FDD power or move the connector slightly, it boots up fine.

I'll take a look at the connector more closely tomorrow, and see if I can find the problem.. I didn't presume it to be a repairable problem.

 

[Unknown_K]

http://www.a68k.de/xtechwb/filez/AMIGA/Hacks+Reps/Amiga_Floppy_Teil_1.pdf
This is a list of drives that work on Amigas as is or with mods. Generally the HD drives (except for the 357A) only work in DD mode. Don't forget that some Amiga drives are not the same thicknes as standard PC drives and the front bezels can be different so they are not an exact fit.

The A stands for Amiga floppy drive. They tweeked the data rate in HD mode to be the same as DD mode so the Amiga can read HD floppy disks (custom chipset limitation). I have seen FZ-357A drives sell for $100.

 

[MikeS]

The A stands for Amiga floppy drive. They tweeked the data rate in HD mode to be the same as DD mode so the Amiga can read HD floppy disks (custom chipset limitation). I have seen FZ-357A drives sell for $100.

Ah, thanks; thought I could retire from selling a few non-A FD357s but alas... ;-(

 

[modem7]

There's no apparent damage, it just randomly makes the machine not boot, but if I disconnect the FDD power or move the connector slightly, it boots up fine.

One of my Toshiba T1100 laptops had intermittent 3.5" diskette operation. I measured +12V on the power plug coming into the drive, but when I measured the +12V line in the drive, the voltage was varying from something like about 8V up to 12V. I reseated the power plug many times but that didn't fix the problem. I was able to fix the problem by using a scalpel to scrape away a very significant layer of oxide that had built up on the pins of the drive's power connector.

 

[Chuck(G)]

Ah, thanks; thought I could retire from selling a few non-A FD357s but alas... ;-(

In particular, it was a matter of "lowering the river" instead of "raising the bridge". The Amiga drives cut the spindle speed to (IIRC) 150 RPM in high-density mode. In the early days of the PC AT, high-density floppy controllers for the PC-XT weren't as common as they were later. Weltec came out with a 5.25" disk drive that lowered its spindle speed to 180 RPM in high-density mode. It wasn't a great idea (recall that the energy induced in a read head is proportional to the square of the linear speed of the medium) and died a quick merciful death. I doubt that many exist today.

 

[Raven]

I suppose that if I don't see a way to fix the connector on here I'll order a replacement one from AmigaKit, since (though I didn't find one there earlier for whatever reason) they seem to have them in stock.

I guess FZ-357A is a pipedream, like finding an Am5x86-150ADZ..