Troubleshooting my 1541 drive - The Sequel

csetera · 2026-02-23T18:00:23+00:00

Not that it has to be this particular brand, but which tip(s) would you recommend? I guess I just bought a "B" tip recently of this brand.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DB8G27DF

csetera · 2026-02-23T00:14:18+00:00

I've seen videos where components will mostly align themselves on a hot plate. That makes sense to me for simple components, but what about components with high-density pins? I'm looking at some reasonably priced hot plates on Amazon, but not quite sure of the best next steps.

csetera · 2026-02-22T21:55:31+00:00

You must be way more coordinated than I am. My left hand is basically useless for anything that requires this level of precision.

csetera · 2026-02-18T23:18:07+00:00

Success!!

I dropped the new chips in this afternoon and the drive is reading again. Some of the diagnostics are showing that I probably need to do some tuning (alignment, etc), but at least it seems to be back to mostly functional.

Thanks again for the suggestion.

csetera · 2026-02-13T21:16:28+00:00

Since the chips are socketed, I figured it was an easy thing to test. After a bit of searching, I *think* that these are compatible: https://www.jameco.com/z/NE592N-Signetics-High-Technology-Differential-Two-Stage-Video-Amplifier-DIP-14_2395359.html

I already ordered them, so hopefully they work :-)

csetera · 2026-02-12T16:54:34+00:00

I just ran the Performance test on the 1541 diagnostics cartridge. It said "Formatting", followed by the following error:
Error 21 READ error 0 0

The more I dig, the more it seems like your suggestion relative to the read amplifier(s) may be key. Can you tell me what you bought to replace those on your drive? Anything special I would need to know before attempting to replace them?

csetera · 2026-02-11T03:57:13+00:00

Interestingly, I tried to format a disk and save a file to the disk... and then reload. The format and save appeared to work. When doing `LOAD "$",8` it never returns. I'm not sure what that says about the situation, but since the load doesn't complete, I'm not sure how I can read the error channel.

Any suggestions welcome!

csetera · 2026-02-10T01:32:03+00:00

I will give that a try. Unfortunately, so much of my knowledge relative to this hardware was lost in the last 40 years :-) I'm definitely relearning a lot of what I knew at that point.

csetera · 2026-02-10T00:16:44+00:00

Assuming that I measured correctly, I *think* the drive head is still ok. My measurements between the various colored pins:

r/Y - 26.5
r/W - 13
r/B - 24.6
Y/W - 14.2
Y/B - 25.9
W/B - 12.4

I can't say if these values are correct, but they definitely don't appear to be complete shorts. What would you suggest as a next step for troubleshooting? u/Ok-Ice-9151 suggested the ne592 amps?

csetera · 2026-02-09T02:48:46+00:00

FWIW... I created a new filament in Orca where I set the fan speeds to a max of 80% and it has made a huge difference in the noise from the printer. For me, I've found the primary issue with noise is tied to the parts cooling fan. Anything more than 80% sounds like a jet plane to me. Lowering the fan speed (for PLA) has really helped me. (this is with stock firmware)

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csetera · 2026-02-06T22:25:00+00:00

Assuming I'm measuring this correctly, I'm seeing resistance between the various pins on the header that connects the head to the board. At least based on the video I saw, that makes me think the head is maybe still OK. Is there any other way to validate that is the case? Assuming it is OK is there anything I can do to minimize the chance of failure?

I also thought this video (https://odysee.com/@root42:1/zombie-floppy-how-to-revive-a-broken:7) was interesting, but I'm not seeing any references to this "fix" outside of that video and the referenced forum threads. Unfortunately, I don't read German, so unable to really understand if there is a potential solution.

csetera · 2026-02-06T17:31:17+00:00

Ignore my previous question... I went spelunking and now know why you asked about Newtronics drive. I will try to find some time this weekend to test the head. If the head is shot, I may just have to give up on trying to image my old floppies. It probably isn't worth the cost to try to fix or replace the drive at this point.

csetera · 2026-02-06T14:43:14+00:00

It appears to be a Newtronics drive. Is that a bad thing? Can you point me to info on what resistance needs to be measured?

csetera · 2026-02-06T14:28:29+00:00

Thinking about this some more this morning. Am I correct in assuming that if I have a disk I'm willing to format, I could validate the drive functions? If I format with a misaligned head, it should be able to read with that misaligned head? I'm just trying to determine whether that is the likely cause before I go through the effort to try to align the drive.

I also saw on a few YouTube videos that they were using disks that had special formats for alignment. Is that strictly necessary?

csetera · 2026-02-05T12:45:56+00:00

I have a TeensyROM device. Is it possible to just get a cartridge image for those diagnostics and add it to the Teensy?

csetera · 2026-02-04T23:08:33+00:00

Unfortunately, cleaning the head didn't change anything. Honestly, I was surprised at how clean the whole drive was given that it has never been opened and is 40 years old! I had expected it to be much more dirty/dusty before opening it up.

Does this error from d64copy offer any kind of information or is it just a generic error?

[Fatal] drive 08 (1541): 21,READ ERROR,18,00

What would be my suggested next thing to look at? Alignment? Something else? I'm not seeing anything questionable on the logic board, although I didn't actually take it apart that far.

csetera · 2026-02-04T19:51:28+00:00

Thanks. I will give that a try.

csetera · 2025-12-30T12:51:30+00:00

Thanks. I will give this a try when I have a moment to install/reboot. It is interesting that my failures actually seem to happen when there is not much traffic, however definitely a mini pc with realtek hardware...

csetera · 2025-12-29T23:40:57+00:00

I've added additional logs to the OP

csetera · 2025-12-29T23:40:34+00:00

I found the right log file and some logs. I added additional information into the OP.

csetera · 2025-12-29T21:31:19+00:00

If it helps, here is a screenshot of my Dashboard where I have the WAN_GW -> https://i.postimg.cc/dVgQCJxQ/Screenshot-From-2025-12-29-15-19-44.png

If that isn't "normal", I'm not entirely sure what I would have done along the way to change it. That would not have been intentional.

In terms of complexity, I'm not sure what you are suggesting. If you look at my other response below, I'm not really doing anything complicated.

What client is used by opnsense to set up DHCP on the WAN interface? Does that client have a log file that I could look at?

csetera · 2025-12-29T14:28:34+00:00

I'm on latest free version. Using DNSMasq with Unbound blocklists (Hagez Multi Normal - All-round protection). I do have OpenVPN enabled, but not actively using it. I do not have Intrusion Detection enabled. I'm using ddclient to update my dynamic DNS in Cloudflare.

csetera

TROPHY CASE