Toshiba T-Series external 5.25 floppy drive

[new_castle_j]

Hello,

Does anyone have experience with Toshiba's external 5.25 floppy drive add on? It's advertised for use with their T-series machines, model# PA7225U. It's a 360K drive that connects via the parallel port and then you flip a switch on the side of the computer case to assign the drive to A: or B: I've been trying to get mine to work with my T3200SXC and so far no success. The floppy drive spins up, but DOS reports back no disk in drive when trying to access. The BIOS utility confirms that the drive is detected on power up. I'm using a Radio Shack parallel cable, I'm wondering if there was supposed to be a proprietary cable from Toshiba?

Thank You!

 

[Stone]

I'm using a Radio Shack parallel cable...

What might that be? It's not very definitive. Not all parallel cables are created equal.

 

[krebizfan]

A Laplink style cable will not work. I can't find any documentation showing what the pin out of the external floppy is. Maintenance manual covers the laptop pinout.

I think the problem you have is that several pins are in the wrong place so the signals aren't getting through. If you have a multimeter, check that pins 1-6 are connected to the same pin position on both sides of the cable. On the laptop side, those pins handle drive ready and track 0.

Edit: Never mind. Looks like it isn't a pass through cable but rearranges the pins in a different manner. So you will need a Toshiba cable. Or if you trust the source, do a breakout box and reorder the pins yourself. http://oldcomputer.info/portables/t1200/index.htm has the 5.25" drive pin out which I think would be the same drive as used for the T3200. Double check before trying anything though.

 

[new_castle_j]

Fantastic!! Thanks for the link, I will do my testing with the pinouts provided. I did try also with a straight thru DB25 ended ribbon cable and got the same results. This newfound information will give me a project this afternoon!!!

 

[new_castle_j]

Just posting a follow up, I re-configured by Radio Shack cable according to the new pinout and VOILA!! External floppy drive is working flawlessly!
Thanks Again!!!