Sord M23 mk III - no format, not recognised

HxC Floppy emulator support for all others computers...
Post Reply
arjoll
Posts: 15
Joined: Thu Jan 15, 2015 5:03 am
Location: Invercargill, New Zealand
Contact:

Sord M23 mk III - no format, not recognised

Post by arjoll »

After the success with the Sord M68, I thought it was time to give the M23 a go. This was a "mk III" version which uses two SSQD 100 tpi floppies - 320k on a single sided disk using Teac FD-50-C drives.

Initially I had a similar issue as the M68 - "ROTATION SPEED ERROR" whatever that means. I had a couple of FD-50C-11 drives that I picked up from a recycling place, so thought I'd try hooking one of those up to the test rig I made to image the M68 HD disk, and surprisingly it images without error, and viewing the image I could see Sord copyright notices etc in there so even though SSQD isn't anything a PC knows about, the drive worked.

That's where the similarity with the M68 stopped. In that case, I had read errors because of a dodgy drive but could list the directory, and Jeff sorted out the image so I could use it as a copy destination. On the M23, I cannot read the disk - I get DISK FAIL when trying to list the directory, and it will not boot off the disk - it doesn't even try, with "RA" flicking but no other activity.

I'm wondering if this would be something that's related more to interfacing? When trying to init the disk, it steps rapidly up and down the track numbers but fails on every track, but it doesn't even seem to try when trying to list the directory or boot. The jumpers set on the FD-50C are HM, MX and one of the DS lines. This particular drive (100tpi) seems reasonably uncommon, but it looks like the TRS-80 used the 50A 48 tpi version so I'm hoping there's some more info out there. The spec sheet for this drive has a note saying that pin 2 is head load, 6 is ready and 34 is drive select 3; I wonder if those are non-standard settings?

Looking forward to any guidance! I've attached the image made on the PC, and put service info I found for the FD-50 here - https://1drv.ms/b/s!Ajyp8sRoAWZanp9hJXS ... w?e=BjE5sF (it's too large to attach).

Thanks :)
Attachments
M23 PIPS III.zip
(155.03 KiB) Downloaded 150 times

Jeff
Site Admin
Posts: 8092
Joined: Fri Oct 20, 2006 12:12 am
Location: Paris
Contact:

Re: Sord M23 mk III - no format, not recognised

Post by Jeff »

How this image was made ?

arjoll
Posts: 15
Joined: Thu Jan 15, 2015 5:03 am
Location: Invercargill, New Zealand
Contact:

Re: Sord M23 mk III - no format, not recognised

Post by arjoll »

Jeff wrote:
Mon Jul 27, 2020 11:25 am
How this image was made ?
Using the "floppy disk dump" option in the HxC software, with a Teac FC-50C-11 drive connected to an old Core 2 Duo motherboard, set to 360k in BIOS. Set to single sided, 80 tracks in the software.

The Sord's format is 80 track, 100 tpi, single sided, 16 seconds, 256 bytes per sector, 300 rpm, 250 Kbps.

Jeff
Site Admin
Posts: 8092
Joined: Fri Oct 20, 2006 12:12 am
Location: Paris
Contact:

Re: Sord M23 mk III - no format, not recognised

Post by Jeff »

Is the Sord disk drive rotating at 300 or 360 RPM ?

arjoll
Posts: 15
Joined: Thu Jan 15, 2015 5:03 am
Location: Invercargill, New Zealand
Contact:

Re: Sord M23 mk III - no format, not recognised

Post by arjoll »

Jeff wrote:
Mon Jul 27, 2020 4:20 pm
Is the Sord disk drive rotating at 300 or 360 RPM ?
Sorry, I thought I'd already answered this and hopped in here to see if there was any news! The drive is running at 300 RPM, and seems accurate based on the 50 Hz strobe.

Jeff
Site Admin
Posts: 8092
Joined: Fri Oct 20, 2006 12:12 am
Location: Paris
Contact:

Re: Sord M23 mk III - no format, not recognised

Post by Jeff »

arjoll wrote:
Sat Aug 15, 2020 5:30 am
Jeff wrote:
Mon Jul 27, 2020 4:20 pm
Is the Sord disk drive rotating at 300 or 360 RPM ?
Sorry, I thought I'd already answered this and hopped in here to see if there was any news! The drive is running at 300 RPM, and seems accurate based on the 50 Hz strobe.
Can you try to format a blank HFE image (with 0 sector) and share it ?

arjoll
Posts: 15
Joined: Thu Jan 15, 2015 5:03 am
Location: Invercargill, New Zealand
Contact:

Re: Sord M23 mk III - no format, not recognised

Post by arjoll »

Jeff wrote:
Sat Aug 15, 2020 1:14 pm
Can you try to format a blank HFE image (with 0 sector) and share it ?
I was going to try this again and report back, but have struck the joys of trying to work with 38 year old hardware - I've now got a Sord which won't boot off anything! One drive that spins with a lot of noise, two that don't spin and all, and one that seems to make noises trying to spin but that's about it. it did boot - once, with two physical drives plugged in - but then wouldn't with the HxC as ID 1 and now doesn't no matter which combination of physical drives as ID 0 and ID 1 I try!

But - I did try this initially, and have attached my result. Not sure how enlightning it will be - I can't see any evidence that the M23 even attempted to start formatting the disk.

I was doing all of the drive swapping in the office seeing it's warmer in here than the workshop (winter in NZ) so am limited in room to do more hardware-level stuff with those drives, but will clear off the workbench in the next few weeks and do more testing out there. I've got six drives and two M23s - I should be able to get some combination that works!

I may also image what I can with the PC rig (assuming I can make a drive work) so at least there's some kind of copy.
Attachments
M23 no sectors after format attempt.zip
(18.77 KiB) Downloaded 104 times

Post Reply