So I have 5 apple /// floppy drives that are way out of wack as they have been sitting for years. A couple were broken with bad TTL chips but they are working again. I just need to adjust the speed.
Im very familiar on the apple II line of floppy drives on how this is done but as for Apple ///'s? Which program should I run? What is the optimum drive speed for the Apple /// Drives? Is it still 300?
I cant seem to find an actual SOS program that will tell me the drive speed and let me adjust the Drive speed pot on the drive mechanism to get it correct.
Any help would be appreciated!
I restored an Apple /// last year where the drive was completely off. I first used the simple optical stripes on the bottom side of the drive to make the initial adjustment (using a light source which flickers with grid power supply, 50 or 60Hz). It was already reading/writing OK, once the simple initial setting was done. Then I used ADTpro to format a disk - and that explicitly complained saying "spinning too fast" / "too slow" (even though there were no errors in reading/writing). So I just repeated the disk formatting option a couple of times and tuned the trimmer to find the spots where it changed to "too fast/slow" - and eventually set it right in between those limits.
There's probably smarter ways with software showing the drive speed. But the disk format error messages worked so well for me, that I didn't even bother...
Macfly, I honestly did the same thing "ADTPRO and an optical tachometer" But I was really hoping there would be a software alternative.
the only difference between disk ii and disk iii is the analog board; disk iii has some extra logic for daisy chaining.
if you have an apple ii lying around, you can either wire up an adapter (or buy one on fleabay) or swap the analog board with a disk ii and do the speed adjustment on an apple ii.
That sounds like a huge pain every time you need to make an adjustment.. There isnt anything native to the Apple ///? If thats the case thats pretty bad.
I don't know if this will work.
Can you boot into apple II emulation then run an early versin of Copy II Plus and use it's disk speed test
Wayne great question! I tried this and yes.. it technically works, But it really doesn't. It always reports the drive being witin spec. If you crank the pot way out of wack it just barely moves the indicator so.. something to do with emulation is making it not accurate.
I may be wrong but, on the hub there should be a strobe disc to set the speed of the drive when it is running. Use an incondesent light or an old floresent lamp to adjust the pot to make the bars on the wheel to look perfectly still.
He said he tried that already and that didn't work - but to be honest that should work ok. I'm puzzled.
If someone else wants to try locksmith via the emulator disk and report back please let me know your results.
https://apple3.org/iiisoftware.html
Some of the dealer diag disks should have a drive speed test on them.
I know they check, read, write, alignment, and the disk switch, but I couldnt find any portion for disk speed on the dealer diags,.
I am starting to think Dorkbert is right about the surefire method of tuning them swapping boards from a Disk II. I am pretty sure one of the drive mechanims is bad and the others just need tuning. I have what I am pretty sure is a veryearly A3M003 floppy drive which has Shugart stickers (not apple stickers) on the drive mechanism and there are some mods to the analog board and the drive has no badging (just looks like a stripped Disk II) and has an apply employees card taped to it. I really want to get that one working. I am not going to throw out the word prototype as alot of people do but it is peculiar.
Might seem like a dumb response, but I have never used Fleabay. I just tried doing a search and it only wants to check my area. How do I search the whole site for something? Seems like a terrible interface.
usually you get all results that "ship to your country". I live in the UK and I won't get results of item listes in the US which don't "Ship to Europe". So in theory you don't have to do anything and you'll get worldwide results by default.
https://apple3.org/Documents/Technotes/TA34233.html
This is the Apple Disk /// Technical Procedures manual.
Please see the section on DDSPEED, page 23 of the PDF. I also suggest spritzing some wiper contact cleaner (DeOxit F5, F meaning Fader, which is used for trimmers/pots) into the pot there. You could simply have oxisised wiper contacts on the trimmer keeping it from reliably doing its job.
Thanks Timelord, thats a good document to have. Any idea as to which diagnostic Diskette it is referring? Its pretty generic sounding.
I think that the tools for DSPEED, should be on the Sara Diags Disk, or the Dealer Diags Disk, or the ///+ Diags Disk. CiderPress shows some files that are likely for this purpose. The specific tool metioned in the literature is this:
1986-apple-ii-5.25-inch-disk-drive-dealer-diagnostics
In order to make that disk, if the image exists, you would first need a perfectly calbrated drive to master it. Note however that all Disk /// speed and alignment tests in the official literature use Apple ][ Emulation mode, on the ///. With luck, perhaps the /// diags disks provide some useful tools for you.
There are no Win7 emulators for the /// to allow me to check what is actually on the disk, and I no longer have a /// system.
The Apple /// Confidence disk also has Disk Tests, but IDR if the Disk Tests options include a live speed test.
https://youtu.be/neZrvK4T4u8
Watching the video, I do not think that the Confidence disk has that kind of test.
You could also put a Disk II analogue board in the drive i place of the Disk /// analogue board, and connect it to an Apple II to test it as drive 2. I don't recall any issues doing that, and I remember there being Disk ][ drives, sold by Apple with Disk /// analogue cards in them, prior to the external, visually redesigned Disk ///, that looked identical to a normal Disk ][ in every respect. One of the two external drives on our company /// machine was one of those, and it always bothered me that it was the only attachment on the system with a non-matching cosmetic design language, at the time.
Thought I'd mention that for about a year I ran an A3M0004 drive with a Disk II analog board on an Apple IIe. I used Copy II Plus to set the drive speed.
Thanks guys. Sorry for the late response. Been busy. So The Sara Diagnostics seem to be the dealer diagnostics. I dont see any difference to the program. I already have the dealer diags and III Plus dealer diags. They do have a floppy test section but it only seems to test address/data R/W errors and the drive switch.
So I unless someone knows for sure I dont think there is anything native to the Apple III for drive speed checking and configuring.
I guess at this point I am going to do what was mentioned and swap parts with some Disk II drives and tune them that way.
That's also true. If the Drive /// is the ribon cable type, not the last run for the ///+, you can hang the pins over the edge, as the main 20 are the same, and the extras are used for device ID/select.
Not sure about that; there's this A II signal on pin 23, purportedly for disabling disk change detection.
I don't know how the drive will behave if that pin is left floating.