Can read floppies but not write

[telengard]

Use the HxC floppy drive emulator software to convert the .adf image to .scp format and then write the .scp image in INDEX mode.

Hi, I have tried that, but will try again ensuring it is index mode.

Your stated - Drive speed is ~301 RPM

What disk drive is this?  That should be either 300 (not 301) or 360.

Make an image using SPLICE mode with 3 revolutions of the disk that you wrote and provide a link to that.  I can look at what your drive wrote and tell you what is going on.

The drive speed showed up in SCP as something like 300.95.  The drive is a Compaq branded 1.44 MB drive, Samsung SFD-321B (161697-FB0).

I just sent the link to the read back floppy using splice mode @ 3 revolutions.

Trying to read the floppy on newer Kick/Workbench versions I get "System Request: Plutos has a read error on disk block 330"

[admin]

Your image looks perfect. It mounts in WinUAE and has no issues.. Plutos pops right up on the Amiga's desktop. It passes the error checking (all sectors are good). I will say that the index mark is VERY close to the start of the track's data... like about 8 bytes... typically this is 40+ bytes, but this could be how HxC created the .scp image from the .adf image. The flux looks great (graphically), which means that the drive is writing correctly.

So, I would say that maybe the alignment between your Amiga disk drive and the Samsung drive is a bit off (not compatible), or more likely you have not cleaned your Amiga disk drive in a very long time. You should be cleaning the drive heads very often in modern times because just about every time you use disks now the oxide is coming off.

[telengard]

Thanks for checking that out. Good to hear that it is working.

Both drive's heads are cleaned, I did it before starting this. The Amiga is a champ with all of the game disks I have.

Any suggestions on how to, calibrate?, one or both drives so I can write back usable disks? Or even just a means to check if that could be the issue.

[admin]

Drives are cheap... there is no way really to align these things. I would just try another drive. If you find that is the same way then your Amiga drive out of alignment slightly, or still more likely the heads are dirty. I find that I have to clean the drive heads just about every disk that is inserted into the drive.

One other thing you could check is that the Samsung drive you are using is backwards for LD/HD. Go to the SuperCard Pro's pull-down menu and make sure that the density is set correctly... or trying changing it to the other value.

[telengard]

thanks for the advice, I switched to a Mitsumi D360M3 and it has worked every single time. Not sure what is up w/ the Samsung as it is pretty highly recommended (it's also a REV T1), but as you mentioned could be any number of things.

[admin]

You may not know the history of that Samsung drive. That could be very worn out mechanically (stepper motor/lead screw). That does happen. I have had to toss drives that were worn. What I could do is make a drive tester routine. Basically, you step the head in one direction up a few tracks and stop and do the write. Then step back down and repeat and do the read. You then do the same thing coming from the opposite direction. You can determine the flux level (deviation) which can tell you how much slop there is in the stepper mechanism. I really need to do that and also do a test for what flux areas can be written (to determine Macintosh compatibility for writing).