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User profile for user: brent.k
brent.k Author
User level: Level 1
8 points

Apple IIe won't read floppy disks

A few months ago, I had gotten an Apple IIe from a garage sale, but it turns out it doesn't read any disks. I'm not super familiar with Apple II hardware, so I'm not sure if it is the Disk Interface Card, or the Disk II drive (there's only one drive). There seems to be power going to the drive, but it does not read the disks. All that is displayed on the screen is Apple II at the top. Iremoved all other cards (Super Serial card and memory expansion card) and put the interface card in every slot, with no luck.


Thank You,

Brent

Apple IIe-OTHER, Other OS

Posted on Jun 19, 2012 4:07 PM

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User profile for user: JustSomeGuy
JustSomeGuy
User level: Level 3
606 points

Posted on Jun 20, 2012 8:53 AM

Welcome to the Apple II world. You'll find there is a vibrant user community that is actively developing new hardware and software for it.


The behavior you're seeing is pretty typical of the startup when there's no (readable) disk in the drive. It'll spin forever until it's able to read something, or you hold down the Control key and hit Reset. It sounds like the interface card and the drive are probably healthy, since it starts up when you turn on the power.


As you suggest, there are several things that can be at fault here:

1. The disks may be bad, or not formatted, or not formatted for Apple IIs.

2. The drive may need to have its head cleaned. See: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CMF3PL17kqg


If you put the Super Serial card back in, you can try bootstrapping via serial port - and then formatting one of those disks to see if you can get any farther. See:

http://adtpro.sourceforge.net/bootstrap.html

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User profile for user: JustSomeGuy
JustSomeGuy
User level: Level 3
606 points

Jun 20, 2012 8:53 AM in response to brent.k

Welcome to the Apple II world. You'll find there is a vibrant user community that is actively developing new hardware and software for it.


The behavior you're seeing is pretty typical of the startup when there's no (readable) disk in the drive. It'll spin forever until it's able to read something, or you hold down the Control key and hit Reset. It sounds like the interface card and the drive are probably healthy, since it starts up when you turn on the power.


As you suggest, there are several things that can be at fault here:

1. The disks may be bad, or not formatted, or not formatted for Apple IIs.

2. The drive may need to have its head cleaned. See: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CMF3PL17kqg


If you put the Super Serial card back in, you can try bootstrapping via serial port - and then formatting one of those disks to see if you can get any farther. See:

http://adtpro.sourceforge.net/bootstrap.html

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Apple IIe won't read floppy disks

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