🚀 go-pugleaf

chughey@cos.com wrote:

: In article <1993Sep19.163913.11247@leland.Stanford.EDU>, 
: <milli@leland.Stanford.EDU> writes:
: > Xref: cos su.computers:2256 comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware:78079 
: comp.sys.ibm.pc.misc:41580 biz.comp.hardware:1100
: > Newsgroups: 
: su.computers,su.computers.ibm,comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware,comp.sys.ibm.pc.misc,biz
: comp.hardware
: > Path: 
: cos!darwin.sura.net!spool.mu.edu!agate!headwall.Stanford.EDU!nntp.Stanford.EDU!
: milli
: > From: milli@leland.Stanford.EDU (Manish Malhotra)
: > Subject: Simple (?) problem in a: drive
: > Message-ID: <1993Sep19.163913.11247@leland.Stanford.EDU>
: > Sender: news@leland.Stanford.EDU (Mr News)
: > Organization: Stanford University, California
: > Date: Sun, 19 Sep 93 16:39:13 GMT
: > Lines: 42
: > 
: > 
: >  
: > 
: > Hello, all.  
: > I recently bought a 386 computer (used) and am experiencing a problem 
: > with the disk drive - a 5.25 floppy drive.  
: >  
: > PROBLEM:If I do a dir a: , it will give me the contents of the floppy in 
: > a: drive.  However, if I remove the floppy and insert another floppy into 
: > the a: drive and again do a dir a:, it will give me the same contents 
: > (i.e. of the previous floppy).  The light does go on, and it makes the
: > rotating noise, so it does seem to be "trying".  However, if I reboot
: > and insert the *2nd* floppy in, it will give me the accurate contents of
: > the floppy.
: > 
: > Can the problem be easily fixed?  Does it lie in the disk drive or in the 
: > 
: > p.c. hardware?  Any advice will be greatly appreciated.
: > 
: > Thanks. 
: > 
: > Paul Gupta
: > 
: > 510-528-0618
: > 

: I've had this problem before on a couple of systems. It seems there is a sensor
: in the drive that lets the PC know the floppy has been changed. One time I
: fixed the problem by just "blowing out" the drive with a can of compressed air.
: Another time I found the culprit to be a bad ribbon connector between the drive
: and the controller. 

: If neither of these work, I would suggest swapping your floppy drive with a
: known good one. It might possibly be a controller problem, but it always seemed
: to be drive related. Good Luck.


: Carl Hughey
: chughey@cos.com


I too found a the same problem may be caused by a jumper.  Im my case it was
a 3 1/2" drive, with the small board used to interface the IDE type connector
on the drive to the edge type connector on the cable.  On the board there was
a jumper which is set differently depending on xt/at installation (as I remember
from earlier experience - it was not marked so on the board).  I had to move
the jumper to get the change detect to work.  Apparently the change detect is
one of the signal lines on the floppy cable.  Hope I haven't wasted your time.

Philip E. Test
philt@netcom.com