source for 3.5" internal compatible drives
#1
Question 
Anyone have a 2020 current source for 3.5" internal floppy drives? I'd prefer new.

The sources that come to mind are Amazon, Newegg, ebay.

Floppy drives can get particularly crusty, and so I'm really hesitant to buy Used. Some of the pictures confirm how ugly they can get.

I have probably a half-dozen drives here, and can "refurbish" them myself. I thought it would be nice to have a couple new ones to start fresh......

Some of the prices I'm seeing are absurd....

Thanks
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#2
I have never seen any "new" drives anywhere.  I have purchased a few dozen drives off of eBay and other than one 5.25" drive, I have never had anything that didn't work as expected.  I do look at the pictures to make sure it wasn't stored in an uncovered box in someone's attic for 25 years.  Smile
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#3
(06-25-2020, 01:14 PM)admin Wrote: I have never seen any "new" drives anywhere.  I have purchased a few dozen drives off of eBay and other than one bay 5.25" drive, I have never had anything that didn't work as expected.  I do look at the pictures to make sure it wasn't stored in an uncovered box in someone's attic for 25 years.  Smile

Thanks for the reply.

I was hoping at least for some New Old Stock. Sealed in plastic at least. I know we're grasping at straws a bit here. Found one source that might have them, still following up.

Really looking forward to playing with the SCP. I spent a few years designing similar-ish hardware and software. My solutions worked, but never got to the point where it worked off the shelf 100% perfectly. I think we traded some messages in years past. For now, I want something that will do the job well off-the-shelf before my disks degrade too far.

Thanks
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#4
Well, if you know flux then you should like the editor/analyzer. With that you can duplicate anything. You can rotate track data, set start/end points for writing flux, etc.
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#5
(06-25-2020, 02:49 PM)admin Wrote: Well, if you know flux then you should like the editor/analyzer.  With that you can duplicate anything.  You can rotate track data, set start/end points for writing flux, etc.

Yeah me and flux are old pals. Spent many a years looking at them. Smile

I run www.techtravels.org and the Amiga Floppy Project was one of my main projects for awhile. I've got thousands of posts/comments/emails about it and helped probably a dozen similar efforts over the years. I also designed the Commodore Amiga Floppy Analyzer software. The project/software is mostly defunct, but I still get questions about it regularly.

Lots of fun playing in this space!

Do you know about Josha B of makercentral.net fame? His software is pretty amazing, but oh-so-complicated.

Part of the problem is that producing/selling/supporting/marketing these things is pretty hard! The engineering tasks are fun (and complicated in their own right), but that's really only about half the battle. Hell even just documenting this stuff is time consuming. My incomplete blog has thousands of posts, and I think I only did a mediocre job. People still complained (and everything was open source and free!!)

It seems you've overcome all that, congratulations!

Keith
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#6
Wow, I don't recall seeing your project.

I started the SuperCard Pro project in 2012 and released it in 2013. It was based on the work I had done starting in 1983 (true flux copier for the 1541 disk drives), as well as the work on did on the Option Board while working at Central Point Software, and of course SYBIL and Supercard Ami for the Amiga..  I have shipped thousands of SuperCard Pro boards now, but I do own a company that does product development and production, so that aspect was pretty simple to handle.  Support is easiest if you listen to what people want and try to implement it.  I like the Tom Sawyer approach best myself - get everyone else behind your product and have them help produce things that are compatible.  It's the reason why the .scp image file format is so popular.  It's supported by literally dozens of emulators and utilities at this point.  I don't know how many .scp images are out there (I have 20,000+ for all of the original disks I still have here), but it's a huge amount for sure.  I don't actively market the Commodore stuff.  I am very busy with my full time day job, and I have not really needed to do any type of advertising at this point.  Perhaps when I step down from my day job I will look at focusing on this a bit more.

No, I don't know who Joshua B is.  Other than Keir Fraiser's recent project (and the Flux Engine which has support for .scp images), I have not really followed anyone else's disk projects.  I don't like looking at what others are doing because I want to keep what I am doing on the path that I intended, without being side-tracked by some option or feature that something else might have.
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#7
So, I looked at the makercentra.netl website and see that yet another program that supports .scp images! I had never heard of this before. This person didn't contact me asking any questions about the .scp image file format, so I guess he had no problems implementing it?!
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#8
(06-25-2020, 10:10 AM)keithcbm Wrote: Anyone have a 2020 current source for 3.5" internal floppy drives? I'd prefer new.

The sources that come to mind are Amazon, Newegg, ebay.

Floppy drives can get particularly crusty, and so I'm really hesitant to buy Used. Some of the pictures confirm how ugly they can get.

I have probably a half-dozen drives here, and can "refurbish" them myself. I thought it would be nice to have a couple new ones to start fresh......

Some of the prices I'm seeing are absurd....

Thanks
https://www.newegg.com/p/0XE-0080-006G1?Description=3.5%22%20internal%20floppy%20drive&cm_re=3.5%22_internal%20floppy%20drive-_-9SIAFUD7S61812-_-Product
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#9
(06-26-2020, 01:56 PM)toml_12953 Wrote: https://www.newegg.com/p/0XE-0080-006G1?Description=3.5%22%20internal%20floppy%20drive&cm_re=3.5%22_internal%20floppy%20drive-_-9SIAFUD7S61812-_-Product

Hey, thanks for replying, but, ummmm.....

Are you really suggesting I order a $56 USED drive from China(quoting 5-17 shipping days, only on time 63% of the time) where they can't even guarantee the make or model, the return policy has a restocking fee, return shipping to CHINA isn't covered, and 30% of the reviews of the seller are 1-star? With a 65% customer satisfaction record?

Jeeeezzzz...
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#10
(06-25-2020, 08:20 PM)admin Wrote: [snip] I have not really followed anyone else's disk projects.  I don't like looking at what others are doing because I want to keep what I am doing on the path that I intended, without being side-tracked by some option or feature that something else might have.

Thanks for the earlier snipped history. Very interesting. I'm excited to try out the SCP.

It's funny that you say that, because that was exactly how I felt (feel) about other related projects to mine. I had laser focus on exactly what I was going to make, what technologies I intended on using, methods for achieving that goal, what features to include/skip. I almost ignored other efforts. I just wanted to do what I wanted to do. My time, my money, my project.

It took a couple people to say, "YOU DO YOU, man!" to build my self-confidence enough to continue on my straight path and ignore the naysayers. I love the Amiga and the community, but man it's a tough world sometimes.

Keith
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