Floppy technical problem

  • Thread starter Thread starter Husky
  • Start date Start date
H

Husky

It could just be a dead floppy. or it could be where the troubleshooter leaves
you hanging.

A: Has quit recognizing a floppy when it's in the drive. At one time it did
work which makes me think it's the 2nd problem vs the dead floppy.

When did it quit ? I suspect the moment I installed the DVD Drive. Bringing the
total IDE drives attached to
A: floppy, C: 152 gig Maxtor, D: DVD R/W, E: CD R/W F: Maxtor 300 gig, G: 9.44
gig IBM DTTA

6 total drives. The troubleshooter says more than 4 is too many. If I'd had to
make a choice as to which drive to lose, A: would have been the choice.

But I wasn't asked, it just quit being recognized when a floppy was in it.

Last step, uninstall and let the OS detect and install worked like a charm.

Is there something special needed to have 5 IDE drives on an XP Pro system ?
The troubleshooter quit at that point with 'look elsewhere for help.'

Odd that none of the other drives quit. More than 4 isn't supported ? Works
fine for me at 5 drives.
 
In Husky <[email protected]> had this to say:

My reply is at the bottom of your sent message:
It could just be a dead floppy. or it could be where the
troubleshooter leaves you hanging.

A: Has quit recognizing a floppy when it's in the drive. At one time
it did work which makes me think it's the 2nd problem vs the dead
floppy.

When did it quit ? I suspect the moment I installed the DVD Drive.
Bringing the total IDE drives attached to
A: floppy, C: 152 gig Maxtor, D: DVD R/W, E: CD R/W F: Maxtor 300
gig, G: 9.44 gig IBM DTTA

6 total drives. The troubleshooter says more than 4 is too many. If
I'd had to make a choice as to which drive to lose, A: would have
been the choice.

But I wasn't asked, it just quit being recognized when a floppy was
in it.

Last step, uninstall and let the OS detect and install worked like a
charm.

Is there something special needed to have 5 IDE drives on an XP Pro
system ? The troubleshooter quit at that point with 'look elsewhere
for help.'

Odd that none of the other drives quit. More than 4 isn't supported ?
Works fine for me at 5 drives.
Click to expand...

What happens if you enter your BIOS setup, as the PC is booting, and disable
three mode floppy support? XP doesn't support three mode floppy so there's
known issues with this.

Galen
--

"And that recommendation, with the exaggerated estimate of my ability
with which he prefaced it, was, if you will believe me, Watson, the
very first thing which ever made me feel that a profession might be
made out of what had up to that time been the merest hobby."

Sherlock Holmes
 
The Floppy Drive isn't IDE ! The Floppy drive works from a Floppy Disk
Controller NOT IDE.
What do you have the 5 IDE Hard drives cabled too?? The Motherboard only
supports 4 ide controllers? Do you have a PCI IDE Controller in a PCI Slot?
You may install 4 IDE Hard drives on the IDE BUS, and 2 Floppy drives on
the FDDC Bus Line.
THAT IS ALL UNLESS YOU INSTALL A SEPERATE CONTROLER CARD. You can get
another 4 IDE Hard Drives if you use a PCI Controller card ( or ISA Card)
If you are using SCSI Drives, then that is another story.
 
The Floppy Drive isn't IDE ! The Floppy drive works from a Floppy Disk
Controller NOT IDE.
What do you have the 5 IDE Hard drives cabled too?? The Motherboard only
supports 4 ide controllers? Do you have a PCI IDE Controller in a PCI Slot?
You may install 4 IDE Hard drives on the IDE BUS, and 2 Floppy drives on
the FDDC Bus Line.
THAT IS ALL UNLESS YOU INSTALL A SEPERATE CONTROLER CARD. You can get
another 4 IDE Hard Drives if you use a PCI Controller card ( or ISA Card)
If you are using SCSI Drives, then that is another story.
Click to expand...
And all that helps me get the floppy running again how ?
The system sees the drive and reports nothing wrong, except it can't see a
floppy when I put it in.
 
Did you try different (like brand new) media? Let's look at a possible chain
of circumstances:
1. While installing new drives you needed to undo cables to other drives
(perhaps including your floppy drive.
2. One or more cables (probably floppy) were put in backwards.
3. One or more diskettes were inserted in this state.

In this case the following would happen:
1. The floppy disks would no longer work on any computer.
2. The FDD would not be able to read diskettes.

One thing that may point to this situation is if the floppy drive light
stays on rather than coming on and then turning off.

Questions:
Do you hear sounds from the floppy drive indicating that the drive is
attempting to read a disk?
When you insert a diskette and then try to access it via My Computer, does
the floppy drive light come on and then turn off (eventually)?

If the answer to either is "no" then check all cables and power cables.
 
Did you try different (like brand new) media? Let's look at a possible chain
of circumstances:
1. While installing new drives you needed to undo cables to other drives
(perhaps including your floppy drive.
2. One or more cables (probably floppy) were put in backwards.
3. One or more diskettes were inserted in this state.
Click to expand...
Simplest [and most costly] solution. Seems the floppy has a very tiny power
cord. It wasn't plugged in.
You'd think if the power cord to it weren't plugged in that would shoot up a
red flag to the OS. NOOOOOOOOOOOoo. device is installed and working correctly.
Can you imagine towing your car in cause there's no gas, and the mech says
nothing wrong even without sticking gas in ?

And during the process of getting it plugged back in, getting a little elbow
room and manhandling 300 other cords that are all tied together the printer
took a nose dive.
Now it Gives an overload on the USB port.
I held off more than 7 years getting a printer. I guess I just wasn't meant to
use a printer.
My $10.00 floppy works now and the $97.00 printer is a door stop.
Guess there is an upside. rebooting had to reconfigure every device on the
machine, It lost the boot drive, failed to load OS now that the floppy worked.
Lost another drive, now has a completely screwed up mess.
Could have lost the whole machine for this stupid $10.00 floppy. That's what it
was reporting.
 
Perhaps you should make some other posts regarding these new issues.
I have never ever heard of a printer not working and an OS crashing because
of a Floppy drive. Much more likely something that happened with your cable
handling.

Anyway who needs a floppy these days anyway :)

Husky said:
Did you try different (like brand new) media? Let's look at a possible chain
of circumstances:
1. While installing new drives you needed to undo cables to other drives
(perhaps including your floppy drive.
2. One or more cables (probably floppy) were put in backwards.
3. One or more diskettes were inserted in this state.
Click to expand...
Simplest [and most costly] solution. Seems the floppy has a very tiny power
cord. It wasn't plugged in.
You'd think if the power cord to it weren't plugged in that would shoot up a
red flag to the OS. NOOOOOOOOOOOoo. device is installed and working correctly.
Can you imagine towing your car in cause there's no gas, and the mech says
nothing wrong even without sticking gas in ?

And during the process of getting it plugged back in, getting a little elbow
room and manhandling 300 other cords that are all tied together the printer
took a nose dive.
Now it Gives an overload on the USB port.
I held off more than 7 years getting a printer. I guess I just wasn't meant to
use a printer.
My $10.00 floppy works now and the $97.00 printer is a door stop.
Guess there is an upside. rebooting had to reconfigure every device on the
machine, It lost the boot drive, failed to load OS now that the floppy worked.
Lost another drive, now has a completely screwed up mess.
Could have lost the whole machine for this stupid $10.00 floppy. That's what it
was reporting.
In this case the following would happen:
1. The floppy disks would no longer work on any computer.
2. The FDD would not be able to read diskettes.

One thing that may point to this situation is if the floppy drive light
stays on rather than coming on and then turning off.

Questions:
Do you hear sounds from the floppy drive indicating that the drive is
attempting to read a disk?
When you insert a diskette and then try to access it via My Computer, does
the floppy drive light come on and then turn off (eventually)?

If the answer to either is "no" then check all cables and power cables.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Husky said:
Did you try different (like brand new) media? Let's look at a possible
chain
of circumstances:
1. While installing new drives you needed to undo cables to other drives
(perhaps including your floppy drive.
2. One or more cables (probably floppy) were put in backwards.
3. One or more diskettes were inserted in this state.
Click to expand...
Simplest [and most costly] solution. Seems the floppy has a very tiny
power
cord. It wasn't plugged in.
You'd think if the power cord to it weren't plugged in that would shoot up
a
red flag to the OS. NOOOOOOOOOOOoo. device is installed and working
correctly.
Can you imagine towing your car in cause there's no gas, and the mech says
nothing wrong even without sticking gas in ?

And during the process of getting it plugged back in, getting a little
elbow
room and manhandling 300 other cords that are all tied together the
printer
took a nose dive.
Now it Gives an overload on the USB port.
I held off more than 7 years getting a printer. I guess I just wasn't
meant to
use a printer.
My $10.00 floppy works now and the $97.00 printer is a door stop.
Guess there is an upside. rebooting had to reconfigure every device on the
machine, It lost the boot drive, failed to load OS now that the floppy
worked.
Lost another drive, now has a completely screwed up mess.
Could have lost the whole machine for this stupid $10.00 floppy. That's
what it
was reporting.
Click to expand...

How did the floppy become unplugged in the first place? Any idea? Generally
floppy power plugs grip on like there is no tomorrow.

By the way I've fixed and built many systems over the years. I've never
encountered a situation whereby the entire system had to be reconfigured
because a floppy drive that wasn't plugged in was reconnected. You have a
lot more problems with your system than a floppy drive problem.
 
How did the floppy become unplugged in the first place? Any idea? Generally
floppy power plugs grip on like there is no tomorrow.

By the way I've fixed and built many systems over the years. I've never
encountered a situation whereby the entire system had to be reconfigured
because a floppy drive that wasn't plugged in was reconnected. You have a
lot more problems with your system than a floppy drive problem.
Click to expand...

There's maybe 100 cords inside the box. I've used ties to attempt to organize
them. Making them next to impossible to move more than a fraction of an inch.
Possibly when tying up the 6 foot drive and power cable with 3 or 4 of the
other cables, I pulled the tie too tight pulling the power cord out. Buried
deep in the back of the rats nest of cables, finding the unplugged cable wasn't
easy. Elbowed the printer a bit too far, 4 ft fall, destroyed the USB cable and
connector on the printer.
Printer looked intact, plugged back in, took a single command. reported
overload on USB bus. Had to troubleshoot that problem. Mouse didn't work. No
troubleshooting now. Unplug printer, mouse works, 'New Device detected.' moving
things around 'new devices detected' etc...

But things are working now.
 
Husky said:
There's maybe 100 cords inside the box. I've used ties to attempt to
organize
them. Making them next to impossible to move more than a fraction of an
inch.
Possibly when tying up the 6 foot drive and power cable with 3 or 4 of the
other cables, I pulled the tie too tight pulling the power cord out.
Buried
deep in the back of the rats nest of cables, finding the unplugged cable
wasn't
easy. Elbowed the printer a bit too far, 4 ft fall, destroyed the USB
cable and
connector on the printer.
Printer looked intact, plugged back in, took a single command. reported
overload on USB bus. Had to troubleshoot that problem. Mouse didn't work.
No
troubleshooting now. Unplug printer, mouse works, 'New Device detected.'
moving
things around 'new devices detected' etc...

But things are working now.

--
Click to expand...
I'm glad to hear things are working. I have a hard time envisioning your
system. I've never seen a box with as many cables inside that yours seem to
have. An unusual setup to be sure. What is the air flow like? Do you have
heat issues?
 
I'm glad to hear things are working. I have a hard time envisioning your
system. I've never seen a box with as many cables inside that yours seem to
have. An unusual setup to be sure. What is the air flow like? Do you have
heat issues?
Click to expand...

P4, 3.2 ghz hyper threading. room for 4 gigs ram. 1 gig current, 1 CD, 1 DVD, 3
HD's 1 is a SATA, 1 floppy, 1-4 outlet USB adapter, ATI AIW, internal modem.
In Florida, heat will kill ya, but I have 3 internal fans, 1 on the chip, one
up front, one on the back, and the heat buildup can get so bad that I've just
taken to running commando with the sides completely open to air flow.

It burned up the 1st 300 watt power supply with the sides off about 2-3 hours
after getting it home. Went to 450 on the shops dime.

Now the monitor software alerts when the fan drops below 3000 rpm normal
because of cool running It idles at 2600 just on the border.

Chip temps just a bit over 98.6...
Could stick another fan or two on, but not real sure the chips were designed to
run at less than 100 degrees.
 
If you have 100 cords in your computer you don't need the un-necessary
printer anyway!
Maybe you should think about scrapping that "Cord" hogging piece oj junk
and get you a new computer ( maybe a "Dell") I think a person like you
deserves a DELL.
(think about that)
 
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