XF 551 - Troubleshooting

[Patrik]

Gents,

Recently I just refurbished my old Atari stuff: 130 XE, 1050 and XF 551 and I run into an issue with XF 551. The XF 551 starts booting, but afterwhile it gets stuck and it does not load the OS. It takes a while to display an error - ERROR 173. The 1050 works fine and no issue.

 

I loaded SmartDos using 1050 to check the RPMs and it shows 360 RPMs (or 362) for the XF 551 (btw I also checked the RPMs for 1050 and the number is sort weird 344 RPMs).

 

I also did the test of sectors reading and writing (Test sector option) - it starts doing correctly for the 1st 15-16 sectors, but then it gets stuck resulting in ERROR 144.

 

Any idea? Should I clean the heads of XF 551 or is it st more serious - the disk itself or disk controller?

 

Any help appreciated

 

Thanks

PAt

[svenski]

Gents,

Recently I just refurbished my old Atari stuff: 130 XE, 1050 and XF 551 and I run into an issue with XF 551. The XF 551 starts booting, but afterwhile it gets stuck and it does not load the OS. It takes a while to display an error - ERROR 173. The 1050 works fine and no issue.

 

I loaded SmartDos using 1050 to check the RPMs and it shows 360 RPMs (or 362) for the XF 551 (btw I also checked the RPMs for 1050 and the number is sort weird 344 RPMs).

 

I also did the test of sectors reading and writing (Test sector option) - it starts doing correctly for the 1st 15-16 sectors, but then it gets stuck resulting in ERROR 144.

 

Any idea? Should I clean the heads of XF 551 or is it st more serious - the disk itself or disk controller?

 

Any help appreciated

 

Thanks

PAt

 

The errors are , from memory, bad sector or write protected disk and file not found. Might be a dodgy disk, see if you can duplicate it using the 1050 and try a fresh disk.

[Rybags]

My bet is the drive is probably fine and needs head-clean at most.

 

Errors > 144 are not usually hardware related and Error 144 is very generic and can be generated by a software problem such as trying to read an invalid sector #

 

Best way to test is to boot from a known good floppy, or even better via APE so you know for sure that you're getting a stable DOS boot.

[Patrik]

My bet is the drive is probably fine and needs head-clean at most.

 

Errors > 144 are not usually hardware related and Error 144 is very generic and can be generated by a software problem such as trying to read an invalid sector #

 

Best way to test is to boot from a known good floppy, or even better via APE so you know for sure that you're getting a stable DOS boot.

[Patrik]

Hi,

thanks for the advice. I will do the clean of the head and I will see how it goes. Btw I used the same booting disk for 1050 and XF 551 and when booting from 1050 it works fine, when booting from XF 551 it starts booting, but it stops after while resulting in Error 173.

 

Error 144 is displayed when testing sectors (reading) using SmarDos feature Test sectors.

 

 

Thanks,

Pat

[Patrik]

My bet is the drive is probably fine and needs head-clean at most.

 

Errors > 144 are not usually hardware related and Error 144 is very generic and can be generated by a software problem such as trying to read an invalid sector #

 

Best way to test is to boot from a known good floppy, or even better via APE so you know for sure that you're getting a stable DOS boot.

[Patrik]

I tried to do the head clean and unfortunately it did not help. The issue still persists i.e. it starts reading 1st 15-16 sectors and then it stops resulting in "Boot error".

 

I also formated a new diskette/floppy disk and put dos files as a new boot floppy and it did not help. When booting from the 1050 it goes well.

 

It seems to me that it looks that it can not evaluate the position of the head. I tried to do formatting using XF 551 and it did a really weird thing. The head of the drive tried to go over the limits and only it stopped the head was the mechanical part which is part of the disk (the sound of the stepper drive was really strange).

 

Any ideas?

 

Thanks

PAt

[+bob1200xl]

There are 18 sectors on a track, so you don't have to move the head to be able to access the first 18 sectors. For the 19th sector, you have to seek in to the next track - which sounds like the source of your problems. I don't know any simple way to resolve things like this other than swapping the drive and then the controller. You can try a 3.5 drive if you do not have a 5.25, but be aware of possible conflicts. Just format a disk in the 3.5 and see if that seems to work better.

 

Bob

 

 

 

I tried to do the head clean and unfortunately it did not help. The issue still persists i.e. it starts reading 1st 15-16 sectors and then it stops resulting in "Boot error".

 

I also formated a new diskette/floppy disk and put dos files as a new boot floppy and it did not help. When booting from the 1050 it goes well.

 

It seems to me that it looks that it can not evaluate the position of the head. I tried to do formatting using XF 551 and it did a really weird thing. The head of the drive tried to go over the limits and only it stopped the head was the mechanical part which is part of the disk (the sound of the stepper drive was really strange).

 

Any ideas?

 

Thanks

PAt

[31336haxx0r]

The drives in XF551s are standard IBM PC compatible drives. They used some creative jumpering to use them in the XF551. I can't remember off hand what to do with the XF551 drive to get it to work on a PC, but I think it wasn't much. Then you could just try to format a 360 kB disk on your PC and see if the drive works. If it doesn't, the drive is bad. If it does, the XF's controller seems to have some issues.

You could also try to ge a real 360 kB PC disk drive to work in the XF. I did that once with a Teac drive and it worked well for reading and writing (but oddly not for formatting). All I did was changing some jumpers.

 

I remember there were different ROM versions inside the XFs.I have an XF here that just didn't want to read or boot correctly. When I changed the EPROM for a known working version of the XF ROM, it worked like a charm.

[+CharlieChaplin]

Hmmm,

 

360 RPM ?!? Normally the XF should work with 300 RPM... What drive mechanic do you have inside your XF (Mitsumi or Chinon or some other drive) ?!?

I don`t think its the case here, but 5,25" HD drives spin with 360 RPM - still I think that the RPM check in SmartDOS shows wrong values.

 

On the other hand, in the past it happened from time to time (to me and friends) that the 1050 had the wrong RPM. It could still read and write to disks that were formatted with this drive, but it could not read disks that were formatted on another drive (and other drives could not read disks that were formatted on this drive). So maybe there is something wrong with the RPM on your XF drive... just a guess.

 

-Andreas Koch.

[31336haxx0r]

Wasn't it like 360 RPM for 5 1/4" drives and 300 RPM for 3 1/2" drives regardless of density? I can't remember anymore.

[+CharlieChaplin]

Wasn't it like 360 RPM for 5 1/4" drives and 300 RPM for 3 1/2" drives regardless of density? I can't remember anymore.

 

Well,

almost. For 3,5" drives 300 RPM for both DD and HD.

For 5,25" drives 300 RPM for DD and 360 RPM for HD...

 

-Andreas Koch.

Edited September 10, 2011 by CharlieChaplin

[31336haxx0r]

Ah, thanks!

[Patrik]

Folks,

thanks for the help, but I also checked the PCBs of XF 551 etc. The issue still persists. The speed looks really weird, but SmartDos - speed checker displays this.

 

Anyway I will be working on a fix and I will let you how the things are.

 

Thanks,

Pat

[Mathy]

Hello Patrik

 

I loaded SmartDos using 1050 to check the RPMs and it shows 360 RPMs (or 362) for the XF 551 (btw I also checked the RPMs for 1050 and the number is sort weird 344 RPMs).

If you're in the USA or Canada, you're in trouble. If you're in Europe, that's normal. The USA and Canada use a frequency of 60 Hz on their power net, while the Europeans use 50 Hz. This influences the speed test's results. Divide the above values by 60 and multiply the results by 50 and you will see that the XF will do 300 RPM and the 1050 will do 288 RPM. (plus or minus a few RPM)

 

CU

 

Mathy

[31336haxx0r]

I think this is exactly the issue I had back then. I (probably) had a 60 Hz XF while in Europe 50 Hz are used. Oddly, I had the correct 220V power supply (the drive was NOS). Try swapping the EPROM with a known working (60 Hz) one. If there is no EPROM soldered in, then you can solder in a socket and flip a jumper. IIRC it was the only jumper on the board.

[BillC]

The drives in XF551s are standard IBM PC compatible drives. They used some creative jumpering to use them in the XF551. I can't remember off hand what to do with the XF551 drive to get it to work on a PC, but I think it wasn't much. Then you could just try to format a 360 kB disk on your PC and see if the drive works. If it doesn't, the drive is bad. If it does, the XF's controller seems to have some issues.

You could also try to ge a real 360 kB PC disk drive to work in the XF. I did that once with a Teac drive and it worked well for reading and writing (but oddly not for formatting). All I did was changing some jumpers.

 

I remember there were different ROM versions inside the XFs.I have an XF here that just didn't want to read or boot correctly. When I changed the EPROM for a known working version of the XF ROM, it worked like a charm.

The stock XF551 mechanism jumpers are set to DS0, and would need to be changed to DS1 for testing with a PC.

[1050]

Any idea? Should I clean the heads of XF 551 or is it st more serious - the disk itself or disk controller?

 

Yeah, and nothings wrong with anything. The unnamed OS disk was written by a 1050 which does not use an index hole to line up it's sectors with and the XF551 is only capable of reading sectors that the index hole lines up with. Since the two drives turn at different speeds it's guaranteed that you can't read the entire disk (Atari's planned obsolescence in full bloom here), you are just running out of those sectors that it can read because the index hole is not in the right place anymore.

 

The other way this works is the disk won't even start to read at all by the XF551 but works fine in the 1050. If you want your disks to work with both drives then format them in the XF551 and these problems go away.

[31336haxx0r]

No, I'm 99% sure, a XF551 can read disks formatted and written by a 1050.

 

Edit: now I'm curious. I have both a 1050 and a XF551 here. When time permits, I will try that.

Edited September 13, 2011 by 31336haxx0r

[spookt]

No, I'm 99% sure, a XF551 can read disks formatted and written by a 1050.

 

Edit: now I'm curious. I have both a 1050 and a XF551 here. When time permits, I will try that.

 

Hmm, I thought the XF551 should read anything a stock 1050 writes. IIRC some mechs in the XF have issues with flippies so if you've written to the back of a disk by flipping it over in the 1050 YMMV.

Edited September 13, 2011 by spookt

[1050]

No, I'm 99% sure, a XF551 can read disks formatted and written by a 1050.

 

Edit: now I'm curious. I have both a 1050 and a XF551 here. When time permits, I will try that.

I know I'm right - One of the key secrets to getting the IBM program Util.exe to read 1050 disks (look in UMich archive for it) was to be sure and have three or four copies of the Atari disk you wanted to read on hand and when the one in the drive quit reading you just swap it for another and hope it takes off reading again. Eventually you get the file read in completely and transfered to the PC!!! If you didn't know about having the multiple disks on hand and swaping them out prior to trying it, the program NEVER worked, always got hung up. I got Util.exe to work great! I got Happy's IBM disk reader program to work as well and used that for a long time for two way transfers, until I found Hias' AtariDSK which is a real dream come true. So good I still don't have an SIO2PC setup, as I don't need it. I really should cook one of those up sometime.

[31336haxx0r]

This is not true. The IBM PC's way of reading disks cannot be compared to the way the XF551 works. We are not talking about PCs here but XF551.

 

My guess is still, that the topic starter's XF551 needs the correct firmware and it will run fine.

[+kheller2]

Any idea? Should I clean the heads of XF 551 or is it st more serious - the disk itself or disk controller?

 

Yeah, and nothings wrong with anything. The unnamed OS disk was written by a 1050 which does not use an index hole to line up it's sectors with and the XF551 is only capable of reading sectors that the index hole lines up with. Since the two drives turn at different speeds it's guaranteed that you can't read the entire disk (Atari's planned obsolescence in full bloom here), you are just running out of those sectors that it can read because the index hole is not in the right place anymore.

 

The other way this works is the disk won't even start to read at all by the XF551 but works fine in the 1050. If you want your disks to work with both drives then format them in the XF551 and these problems go away.

 

 

I think you are talking about "hard sector" discs. The XF, and only one version of the XF, uses the index hole during formatting, only, as I recall.

 

SSSD disks are fully compatible with the XF and 1050 no matter which was formatted or written to where. SSED discs should be as well.

[Bryan]

The XF can read 1050 disks just fine. If it couldn't, it also wouldn't be able to load most commercial software.

[1050]

And of course everyone is assuming that the drive mech has never been replaced with an improperly jumpered IBM drive mech which might explain everything? And I'm NOT referring to the drive number jumpers at all here - other jumpers CAN control index hole behavior just for starters among other aspects.

 

Patrik, could you please remove the cover and give us the make and model number for the drive mech so we can look up some jumper settings for it? The numbers we need might be under the side rails? TIA.

 

AtariDSK won't work right unless the disk is first formatted on the PC - that's a fact. Put that in your pipe and smoke it.

These are using PC drive mechs, and when they display PC behavior it confuses you? Somethings not right for sure, but the behavior is totally repeatable and I've come across it before, I'll bet that if Patrik made several copies of the OS disk using his 1050 and swapped them out as I described for using the Util program it might go ahead and load on up? Util was specially written to retry on read errors forever though, so it may only try three times and quit before a different disk can be inserted stopping the load entirely.

 

Something different every day around here.