5.25" drive identification

From: Al Hartman <alhartman_at_yahoo.com>
Date: Fri Apr 18 23:16:01 2003

> From: dlormand_at_aztecfreenet.org (DAVID L. ORMAND)
>
> I have been told (by an IT professional, take that
> for what it's worth) that 5.25" 360K drives have
> the latch handle on the left side of the drive, and
> the 1.2M drives have it on the right side. All the
> drives I have in view right now, this is true.
>
> Anybody have a notion of whether this is absolutely
> true in fact?

You've already gotten an answer from others on the
list on this. LOL!

> It sure would make sorting drives easier than
> trying them out on an old peecee! (Which actually
> needs to be done anyways, to test for
> functionality.)

A rule of thumb I use, but I won't swear is
universal... Is the LED color. USUALLY... Red LED
signifies 360k/180k Drives, and a Green LED signifies
1.2mb Drives.

And I also think that as for IBM Drives, the 360k at
one point were made with and Asterisk molded into the
front case. I could have this reverse. But, I seem to
remember some discussion (perhaps here) that someone
thought it was odd that IBM would start adding the
asterisk to 360k Drives, hence having some with and
some without, rather than just making all 1.2mb drives
with asterisks.

I may have this one reversed though.

But, I've used the LED color as a good indicator for
years.

Also, if you look at the jumpers on the logic board,
near the drive select jumpers... A 1.2mb drive should
have a Speed Select Jumper (SS) to select High speed
Data Transfer to work on AT-Standard Floppy
Controllers, and low speed (for what? I don't know...
Maybe to work on an 8in Drive Controller?)

So, that's another indication of whether the drive is
high or low density.

Regards,
Al Hartman
The New Yahoo! Search - Faster. Easier. Bingo
http://search.yahoo.com
Received on Fri Apr 18 2003 - 23:16:01 BST

This archive was generated by hypermail 2.3.0 : Fri Oct 10 2014 - 23:35:44 BST