[Coco] Back to the COCO

[Robert Gault]

Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>
> I have finally had the chance to get back to my COCO's
> again.  I joined the mailing list again but haven't got
> the patience to wait for it to get approved.  :-)
>
> Why, you say?  Because After setting up a couple of COCO's
> that worked fine the last time I had them out, I find that
> all of them have problems.  Right now I have a COCO3 and a
> COCO2 on the desk.  I have tried two different floppy controllers,
> one of the originals and FD 502.  I have tried them with
> DECB, HDB-DOS and NitrOS9.  I have tried 2 real COCO drive
> boxes (2 thinline floppies horizontally  mounted), one original
> floppy (vertical mount, no built in cable) and a TEAC 55GFR
> that I have used successfully on many old systems.  Oh yeah,
> I even tried a 720K 3.5" drive.  Nothing.  Can't get a DIR
> from anything.  Can't DSKINI anything.  I also have Glenside
> IDE cards.  Can't get them to DSKINI either.  Have a Cloud9
> SCSI.  Same story. I have tried all the normal stuff (cleaning
> edge connectors, multiple different cables) and nothing seems
> to work.  Well, except Drivewire.  But that only seems to work
> from the COCO3.  All attempts from the COCO2 get "protocol errors"
> in the log.
>
> Any suggestions?
>
> Just as a point of reference, these are not the only old systems
> the seem to have failed all on their own over time while sitting
> on the shelf.  I also have TRS80 Model 3 and 4 systems and all
> of my FRE-HD modules seem to have stopped working after sitting
> on the shelf for a couple years. :-(
>
> Looking forward to getting this stuff going as I have a couple
> of COCO projects others my also find interesting if I can make
> them work again.
>
>
> bill
>
>
>

Bill,

Take a deep breath and try to give us the details on just one system and its 
failings; say the Coco3 with some drive. :)

1) Is there an MPI in the system?
2) Does Disk Basic at least boot and give the log-in message?
3) When you try a disk command, does the drive/disk start to spin?
4) Have you opened the drive and watched the strobe markings to see if the spin 
speed is correct?
5) What if any error messages do you get?
6) Are your disks any good? Can you manually turn the medium within the sleeve 
with "no" friction? This assumes 5.25" disks.

Without basic information, we can't provide help.

Robert