Local pickup - Arche 386SX laptop

[rubber_jonnie]

It's not that bad. That's what the video is all about, adjusting the head alignment. It's far easier with the stepper motor and helical actuator. Loosen the screws slightly and rotate small amounts until you get the disk to read well, or you can stick an oscilloscope on the controller board if you want to try to optimise the signal.

I'll have a look and see if I can find test point, the only issue is the other drives seem to have stopped working, so a bit concerned something else has failed.

[PhilC]

What's the controller chip just out of interest?

[rubber_jonnie]

What's the controller chip just out of interest?

Not sure but I suspect it's integrated with the chipset.

[HigashiJun]

@rubber_jonnie

Just some thoughts:

- PC floppy drives are set to DS1 (Drive Select) = I think your drive is set to DS1 so no worries here
- PC floppy drives use Pin 34 of the cable for DC (Disk Change) = Pin 6 of your Arche IDC cable should be connected to pin 34 of the adapter
- PCs don’t need RDY, DC assumes RDY in PC
- PC floppy drives map density (DD/HD) to Pin 2 = so if you connect pin 2 to pin 34, something goes wrong (Pin 11 of your Arche IDC cable should be connected to pin 2 of the adapter)

Don't know though if that helps you, but I would personnally check thouroughly all the above mentioned staments before tinkering with the stepper of a known working drive.

And once again, the TEAC FDD previously mentioned allows to change Density select, RDY, DC and other settings a normal drive does not (easily) allow.

[rubber_jonnie]

@rubber_jonnie

Just some thoughts:

Always appreciated :)

- PC floppy drives are set to DS1 (Drive Select) = I think your drive is set to DS1 so no worries here

Correct, all my test drives are set to DS1

- PC floppy drives use Pin 34 of the cable for DC (Disk Change) = Pin 6 of your Arche IDC cable should be connected to pin 34 of the adapter

Theoretically yes, but in actuality pin 2 of the 34 pin connector is connected to pin 6 of the 26 pin connector on the adaptor board, so this is a problem since density select is pin 2 of the 34 pin connector

- PCs don’t need RDY, DC assumes RDY in PC

RDY doesn't seem to be an issue here.

- PC floppy drives map density (DD/HD) to Pin 2 = so if you connect pin 2 to pin 34, something goes wrong (Pin 11 of your Arche IDC cable should be connected to pin 2 of the adapter)

It's not, as I said above, pin 2 of the 34 pin connector is connected to pin 6 of the 26 pin connector.

Don't know though if that helps you, but I would personnally check thouroughly all the above mentioned staments before tinkering with the stepper of a known working drive.

The stepper motor is on the faulty drive, not a known working one.

And once again, the TEAC FDD previously mentioned allows to change Density select, RDY, DC and other settings a normal drive does not (easily) allow.

Indeed, but I don't have a suitable Teac and having trawled through ebay I'm not sure I'll find one cheaply.

I have a suspicion that the Citizen drive that came with the Arche uses a non-standard pinout, and also I think that the problem may now have reached it's final phase because all my drives have stopped working on the Arche and they haven't been touched so should work fine.

Of course I need to test my FDD's to ensure they are all good, but I think it more likely the Arche has a failure. I'll do this at some point today.

I may step away from the FDD for a bit since I have got to come up with a solution for the keyboard ribbon cable as I don't seem to be able to find a suitable FFC with 1mm contacts and a 1mm pitch, they all seem to be .5mm contacts.

I still need to look at the display and see if I can resolve the lines in it, though they aren't terrible. At least the HDD is fixed, and I can easily get software into it by plugging the CF card into another machine, so not the end of the world.

[rubber_jonnie]

OK, so all my drives test fine, definitely something off elswhere now.

[HigashiJun]

@rubber_jonnie

Thanks for your feedback !

Some 3 row jumpers TEAC drives are on sale on Japanese auctions now, so if you are interested, I can get you one from the same seller I got mine.

Prices (all are "Buy it now" auctions) are 3,333 Yens + 520 Yens for shipping, so a total of 3,853 Yen (around £20).

Shipping fees from Japan to the UK would be around 3,150 Yen (£16.35) ~ 3,650 Yen (£18.94), depending on how would the item be packaged.

The drive would finally cost you around £35.34 ~£38.94.

I don't know what the prices are on Ebay, but you can probably find one much cheaper.

It would be also interesting to try with an HXC or a GOTEK if you have one.

I don't think 26 pin Citizen FDDs had a special pinout. I've only heard that Amstrad CPCs and ZX Spectrum +3s had a special pinout on their 26 pin Shugart connector (and I can confirm it).

[rubber_jonnie]

@rubber_jonnie

Thanks for your feedback !

Some 3 row jumpers TEAC drives are on sale on Japanese auctions now, so if you are interested, I can get you one from the same seller I got mine.

Prices (all are "Buy it now" auctions) are 3,333 Yens + 520 Yens for shipping, so a total of 3,853 Yen (around £20).

Shipping fees from Japan to the UK would be around 3,150 Yen (£16.35) ~ 3,650 Yen (£18.94), depending on how would the item be packaged.

The drive would finally cost you around £35.34 ~£38.94.

I don't know what the prices are on Ebay, but you can probably find one much cheaper.

It would be also interesting to try with an HXC or a GOTEK if you have one.

I don't think 26 pin Citizen FDDs had a special pinout. I've only heard that Amstrad CPCs and ZX Spectrum +3s had a special pinout on their 26 pin Shugart connector (and I can confirm it).

Thanks, I'll think about it but I'm a bit wary of spending too much on it as I think there is a deeper problem now. Having tested all of my FDD's, they all work fine, but not on the Arche any more, so need to gather my thoughts on what I'll do next with the floppy.

I don't have a spare Gotek but I can borrow one from my Atari ST external drive housing to see what happens.

I did read something about Citizens not having the same wiring but can't find the link just now.

[HigashiJun]

@rubber_jonnie

Have a look at this, there is an interesting note at the end:

https://old.pinouts.ru/HD/26pin_microfl ... nout.shtml

A guy on another forum said that his the maintenance of his 26 pin Citizen FDD matches the above mentioned pinout.

[rubber_jonnie]

@rubber_jonnie

Have a look at this, there is an interesting note at the end:

https://old.pinouts.ru/HD/26pin_microfl ... nout.shtml

A guy on another forum said that his the maintenance of his 26 pin Citizen FDD matches the above mentioned pinout.

Ahh you found the same thing as me :)

I think mine is different as hinted by the note, but it would take some time to figure it out. As I said though, none of my drives are currently working that were before bar the disk change, so there may be other issues.