Atari 520STFM - FDD Can Read the Disk But Not Load Programs

[OJCAtari]

Hello all,

 

I recently took my Atari 520STFM out of storage. I remember trying to fix this problem before but gave up and now I want to try again. 

 

The ST boots to GEM and I can read the directory of the disks very quickly e.g. double clicking the drive and view the contents.

As soon as I want to load a .prg such as a game it will show  the message "Data on the disk in drive A: may be damaged. You muse the right kind of floppy disk you must connect your hard drisk properly".

 

I tried a few disks with the same error and it wont auto boot the disks on reset. 

 

Any suggestions please, I've attached some images. 

 

A side issue I'm not too worried about; RF loads fine, scart seems to appear in black and white and jump about the screen. I believe I read on this same forum that some CRTs are not compatible with the signal the the ST sends.

 

Thank you in advance.

 

[Zogging Hell]

Well either your disks are knackered or you need to give the drive a clean. Do you have any other way of creating a floppy disk with something on it (PC or other vintage computer)? There are a number of things that could be causing that, but for starters clean your drive heads. It could also be the disks are damaged in storage, or the capacitors in your PSU need replacing. Can you try and format a blank floppy and see it it completes and you can save the desktop info file to it without problems. That might narrow it down.

 

I'd be amazed if a CRT itself had a problem with the ST's video signal, some scart sockets are for RGB, others are for composite on some CRTs so maybe that is the issue, although unlikely. Depending on your geographic location it could be the TV doesn't like 60hz (I presume also vice versa) which will cause a nasty jumping effect, but if the TOS version you are using is from your locale it shouldn't be an issue.

[OJCAtari]

So embarrising.

 

 

Surprised it could read anything in that state. It's working now.

 

The bad part is; its scratched and broken two boxed games I own (Double Dragon and Defender of the Crown).

 

They wont play now, they have a huge line in them.

 

Thank you for responding Zoggin Hell.

[TZJB]

1 hour ago, OJCAtari said:

Surprised it could read anything in that state. It's working now.

 

The bad part is; its scratched and broken two boxed games I own (Double Dragon and Defender of the Crown).

 

They wont play now, they have a huge line in them.

 

Thank you for responding Zoggin Hell.

 

Sorry to hear of your plight. When I took my Atari STFM out of storage, the floppy drive had rusted and didn't work at all! Incidentally your link did not work to which I assume should be an image? Could you drop or paste the image into a message please?

 

If you have physically damaged floppy disks, only a replacement floppy disk can rectify the issue. However a Gotek disk drive substitute may be an alternate solution for you? This would allow the loading of disk images from a USB flash drive instead, with no danger of physical damage to a floppy disk. A memory upgrade is also worth looking into.

 

If it is useful, I found that Double Dragon and Defender of the Crown are on Automation Compilation Disks 045 and 082 respectively. Available at http://ftp.pigwa.net/.

 

Regarding your SCART issue, the resistors in the cable probably need to be corrected and details can be found here:- http://info-coach.fr/atari/hardware/interfaces.php#scart_peritel_cable. An additional 75R resistor is also mentioned and is recommended between the Atari vert sync pin 12 and SCART fast blanking pin 16.

 

I hope that may help.

 

 

[OJCAtari]

I've attached the image this time, I don't think this forum likes ctrl+v posting of images.

 

I do have a ultra satan but I also have a huge box of disks, maybe a few hundred I like to explore. I appreciate the link, I am pretty sure I have copies of DD and DOC, its just I have a handful of boxed original games which I wanted to keep but I also just happened to break those ones.

 

I'm surprised the scart doesn't work on this tv, this is the one I bought years back and I'm pretty sure it worked on my LCD but obviously not on my CRT: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/321231353702?ViewItem=&item=321231353702&ssPageName=ADME:L:OU:ES:3160&euid=e7e17962cdc64e1eb77d5373328be2a8&exe=10062&ext=100155&sojTags=exe=exe,ext=ext&mkevt=1&mkcid=7&mkpid=0&emsid=e11401.m1842.l3160&ufes_redirect=true

[TZJB]

I see what you mean now. Fluff bunnies everywhere.

 

If cleaning your floppy drive can fix the drive then that is a bonus. As to floppy disks, you must be kicking yourself booting original disks and not copies to test it!

 

Your UltraSatan will most likely need more RAM than a standard 520STFM provides and you may need to check that the ST DMA chip is suitable for use with a hard disk as some are sub-standard. Look out for C025913-38 PH23-001A which are said to be faulty.

 

The SCART lead probably should work on your TV, but check your Samsung TV SCART specs as it may only support Composite and S-Video, not RGB. The SCART lead that you purchased mentions 'Components fitted for correct colour and signal control'. If you have a multi-meter, you may opt to confirm continuity and resistance value too.

[Zogging Hell]

18 hours ago, OJCAtari said:

I've attached the image this time, I don't think this forum likes ctrl+v posting of images.

 

I do have a ultra satan but I also have a huge box of disks, maybe a few hundred I like to explore. I appreciate the link, I am pretty sure I have copies of DD and DOC, its just I have a handful of boxed original games which I wanted to keep but I also just happened to break those ones.

 

I'm surprised the scart doesn't work on this tv, this is the one I bought years back and I'm pretty sure it worked on my LCD but obviously not on my CRT: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/321231353702?ViewItem=&item=321231353702&ssPageName=ADME:L:OU:ES:3160&euid=e7e17962cdc64e1eb77d5373328be2a8&exe=10062&ext=100155&sojTags=exe=exe,ext=ext&mkevt=1&mkcid=7&mkpid=0&emsid=e11401.m1842.l3160&ufes_redirect=true

Ouch, that is a dusty drive. Should be fixable if you are willing to take the time to clean it thoroughly, but as TZJB said, once it's clean you will want to test thoroughly with some sacrificial floppy disks once done. Double Dragon and Defender of the Crown aren't too rare so you hopefully will be able to replace them. Double Dragon was in the power pack so should be very cheap to replace.

 

Might be worth flicking through the TV OSD settings to see if you can swap the scart input there (I have a sony which allows you to swap between composite and RGB on the scart socket).

[OJCAtari]

Thanks I will check tv's settings, thank you.

 

To be honest, I had a ton of floppies collected from job lots. I just threw all the copies away, as I couldn't work out which ones are destroying the disk drive. I'd clean it, run a few disks and then some crud would transfer to the heads and destory the next disk.

 

I've kept all the official disks and demo disks.