Thread
64K ROMs and 800K floppy
Mac128, what is your "reference" that mentions this "23" model number? I ask because I've Googled it and haven't come up with much of anything.
Well, first you have to call it what Sony does, NOT Apple. I tell you it's a real miracle anybody put the right prat into anything back then ...
What Apple calls MFP-51W-xx, Sony calls MP-F51W-xx and to make matters worse, when you search the net sometimes you have to leave out the hyphens or sting all the numbers together or leave spaces instead and in different places.
However, Starting wth Tom Lee's own verification on the forum: http://68kmla.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=12635&sid=b0be4fa639868d2a41f45b73549f4ce9
And then this: http://www.nehaia.dk/cm_archives/1997/01/970104.html
And this: http://home24.inet.tele.dk/ccadams/se/super.html
All of these indicate that it came out of a later Mac II or SE. The drive I have came out of a late model Plus. So by deduction, it makes sense it came after the -03 model.
But the thing that was invaluable is a parts list that describes the type of drive and the Sony part number and the OEM it was supplied for, which of course I can't find the link to now ... as soon as I do I'll post it.
What Apple calls MFP-51W-xx, Sony calls MP-F51W-xx and to make matters worse, when you search the net sometimes you have to leave out the hyphens or sting all the numbers together or leave spaces instead and in different places.
However, Starting wth Tom Lee's own verification on the forum: http://68kmla.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=12635&sid=b0be4fa639868d2a41f45b73549f4ce9
And then this: http://www.nehaia.dk/cm_archives/1997/01/970104.html
And this: http://home24.inet.tele.dk/ccadams/se/super.html
All of these indicate that it came out of a later Mac II or SE. The drive I have came out of a late model Plus. So by deduction, it makes sense it came after the -03 model.
But the thing that was invaluable is a parts list that describes the type of drive and the Sony part number and the OEM it was supplied for, which of course I can't find the link to now ... as soon as I do I'll post it.
Thanks for the links.
From reading through the thread in your first link, I found this photo of the bottom of a MP-51W-23 drive. If someone knows the way to decode these serial numbers, perhaps there is date information that could be useful in determining when these were made. Since many people have decoded the serials on old Macs to determine such dates, I don't think it should be impossible to decode these SONY serial codes.
And this company still sells the -23 drive at a tremendous discount of only $29! :
From reading through the thread in your first link, I found this photo of the bottom of a MP-51W-23 drive. If someone knows the way to decode these serial numbers, perhaps there is date information that could be useful in determining when these were made. Since many people have decoded the serials on old Macs to determine such dates, I don't think it should be impossible to decode these SONY serial codes.
And this company still sells the -23 drive at a tremendous discount of only $29! :
A kind soul recently emailed me a PDF of the original Apple documentation for the A9M0106 800k floppy drive. That same kind soul suggested I remove the URL from this post, which I have done (out of fear Apple would fly their lawyers to Europe and shutdown this site for posting Apple II manuals). So if you want the PDF, just PM me.
Anyway, once you have that PDF, scroll down to page vii. Apple states that the A9M0106 is fully compatible with not only a 512ke, not only ROM-upgraded 512k's, but also with stock Macintosh 512k machines (which have 64k ROMs).
The software requirements are shown on page 10.
So the A9M0106 800k floppy drive is fully compatible with my Mac 512k (and therefore not "a hack"). And yet, the flashing LED issue I reported earlier in this thread still exists. I don't see the flashing LED issue as something inherent only to my A9M0106 drive. No doubt it occurs when connecting any A9M0106 drive to any stock Mac512. And so, I will assume that this flashing LED issue, while not specifically mentioned in Apple's drive documentation, was a known issue at the time the drive was sold.
Yes and I was that "kind soul". You'll note from that exact same quote I also wrote:
So two things here:
1) you and I both know that this drive works with earlier systems and finders and can be used as a startup disk just fine and without the HD20 INIT. And
2) If we are using this drive in any other way than specified, it is a HACK.
Finally, clearly my earlier statement has been simmering on some minds. For that I apologize, but I would also take issue that what I said was taken somewhat out of context. By the time I said that, we had been discussing all kinds of things including pulsing of internal drives & formatting MFS 800K disks. I sent you the link to the manual because, you should have it as an owner of one and it helps clarify some things, in particular for me it helps clarify that Apple half-heartedly supported the drive. Had you owned the drive in 1986 when it was released and called Apple support about the disk access light, they would tell you it was known issue and would not affect the operation of the drive and then they would offer to help you order the 800K internal drive upgrade kit. The manual also clarifies the main thing I care about, which is that they do not specifically indicate it is incompatible with the 128K, which of course it is not. In the end the fact that Apple supports it for the stock 512K doesn't make it any less of a hack. It's just an Apple hack. The mere fact they place so many limitations on how it can be used is a dead giveaway. Either way, I am happy to get to the bottom of the issue and indeed, I am willing to admit when I am wrong, particularly when I am the one who continued to research the issue to better understand my own thoughts. But thanks for stealing my thunder and gloating about it!
Oh, one final thing about posting links to copyrighted material for the benefit of the community: this manual comes from what appears to be a Polish or Czech site so it might be hard for Apple to shut them down. But forums like these are crawled almost every night and well indexed for search engines for any corporate attorneys to review. If we want to keep information like this online, we might want to keep this type of link off the record and share privately. Just my two cents.
Also in that manual you'll note on page 10 it also specifically states that the 512K must use the HD20 INIT with the A9M0106 as well as a minimum System 2.1 and Finder 5.1. It also states to ALWAYS start up from a 400K disk from the internal drive. Page 15 is emphatic about this point and encourages upgrading to an internal 800K drive.
So two things here:
1) you and I both know that this drive works with earlier systems and finders and can be used as a startup disk just fine and without the HD20 INIT. And
2) If we are using this drive in any other way than specified, it is a HACK.
Finally, clearly my earlier statement has been simmering on some minds. For that I apologize, but I would also take issue that what I said was taken somewhat out of context. By the time I said that, we had been discussing all kinds of things including pulsing of internal drives & formatting MFS 800K disks. I sent you the link to the manual because, you should have it as an owner of one and it helps clarify some things, in particular for me it helps clarify that Apple half-heartedly supported the drive. Had you owned the drive in 1986 when it was released and called Apple support about the disk access light, they would tell you it was known issue and would not affect the operation of the drive and then they would offer to help you order the 800K internal drive upgrade kit. The manual also clarifies the main thing I care about, which is that they do not specifically indicate it is incompatible with the 128K, which of course it is not. In the end the fact that Apple supports it for the stock 512K doesn't make it any less of a hack. It's just an Apple hack. The mere fact they place so many limitations on how it can be used is a dead giveaway. Either way, I am happy to get to the bottom of the issue and indeed, I am willing to admit when I am wrong, particularly when I am the one who continued to research the issue to better understand my own thoughts. But thanks for stealing my thunder and gloating about it!
Oh, one final thing about posting links to copyrighted material for the benefit of the community: this manual comes from what appears to be a Polish or Czech site so it might be hard for Apple to shut them down. But forums like these are crawled almost every night and well indexed for search engines for any corporate attorneys to review. If we want to keep information like this online, we might want to keep this type of link off the record and share privately. Just my two cents.
You're talking about the software side in the above argument: when loading software off a disk. But my flashing LED issue is a hardware issue that occurs BEFORE any software is loaded. Hence, in regards to my LED flashing issue, the OS version or use of the HD20 INIT is irrelevant.
So basically what I posted above was about the hardware issue, not anything else we've spoken about in this thread pertaining to software issues. And in the sense that using an A9M0106 with a stock Mac512k is perfectly okay according to Apple's own A9M0106 documentation, such use "is not a hack" in my book (even if you consider it "an Apple hack.") If it was truly "a hack" as hacks are normally defined (performed by end users versus the manufacturer), then the LED flashing issue wouldn't be anything unusual. But since my use of the drive is not a hack insofar as Apple says the floppy drive can be used with a Mac 512 and makes no note of potential problems, I became curious as to why Apple would have overlooked this LED flashing issue. If they knew of it at the time of printing that manual, they still could have stated the floppy drive was compatible with a stock 512k but then add a note that "it is recommended to upgrade to 512ke ROMs" in such a case. But there is no such recommendation in that manual. That's all I was trying to say.
That's most likely true and is what I am going to assume here. Even so, the motor still spins (accesses) when the LED flashes. And the LED flashes every couple seconds, so clearly you wouldn't want this to continue for hours on end. But of course, you could also argue you wouldn't want to leave your Mac switched on for hours on end in such a condition anyway.
Post above edited. Link removed.
In fact I'll bet Apple purposely enabled the disk access & LED to drive people nuts and force them to upgrade their 512Ks with the 800K internal drive upgrade kit once they had already purchased the drive. ;-)
In fact I posted this early on in this thread as well:
Therefore, I will say publicly that yes JDW you are in fact right. But I am not wrong, either and I apologize for make such an inflammatory statement.
Hopefully at this point I think we agree, what Apple did here was to offer up a drive with a known issue with 64K ROMs and went ahead and marketed it for use with the stock 512K, but looked the other way and hoped nobody else noticed, because as you point out, nobody in their right mind would switch on their Mac and just leave it sitting there flashing a question mark for any length of time. So in the few seconds it took to load a disk, they gambled no one would be the wiser and if someon did call them on it, they would just play dumb. (Amazing how little seems to have changed in 21 years, just having gone through the MacBook battery recall myself). This goes to my original assertion that Apple did not support the 64K ROMs for any practical purposes following the discontinuation of the 512K (and this drive came out 6 months after that). I guess what I'm saying is I am not surprised Apple did this since it would be admitting their "hack" if they put it in writing. I think they just wanted to sell drives and figured 512K owners would eventually upgrade anyway.
Nevertheless I hope you are able to find a fix for this problem Apple clearly chose to ignore.
And by the way,I said exactly what I meant about Apple shutting down a website offering copyrighted material and I did not say they would "fly their lawyers to Europe" to shut down the site, in fact I said it was unlikely they could. However, I have been around long enough to have seen Apple shut down a lot of online sources that offered such copyrighted items, lest we forget the fantastic www.applerepairmanuals.com – I resent the implication that somehow the fact that Apple II is old means Apple won't defend their copyrights and that I am somehow overreacting. What I do remember is that as soon as applerepairmanuals.com started showing up in the usual forums, just as quickly they got shut down. Since Apple gave up support in 1998 for most of the products which manuals were hosted there, you'd think they wouldn't care. Wrong. We can start a new thread if this needs to be debated further ...
Ah, but they do ... in Apple's own unique way. Page 15 is very clear, Apple wants you to upgrade your drive and ROMs. There is no way Apple did not know of the disk access problem if they ever plugged it into a 512K Mac and I find it hard to believe they would support it in writing without actually testing it. Also, this is not just a problem with the A9M0106, but also the M0131 800K External Disk Drive which had already been out for at least 9 months before, so Apple would have been well aware of that problem for anyone trying to use it with a stock 512K.
In fact I posted this early on in this thread as well:
and Apple makes no mention of any anomolies with the drive ... and as you know, these Knowledgebase articles tend to have been written after the products have been out for a while (and also known to contain lots of erroneous info). So the compatibility of the drive was never in question and the PDF manual is no revelation as far as that goes. But that doesn't make it any less of a hack, whether we are using it inappropriately or Apple put a band-aid on it and didn't make it fully compatible. When I said it was a hack, I meant in the sense that Apple didn't even try to make it fully compatible, or the problem that troubles you wouldn't exist and I said as much in what you quoted as well:
So all I was saying is that Apple never intended the drive to be fully compatible with 64K ROMs whether they officially supported it or not. I only cited the software argument because Apple places official restrictions on the drive which have nothing to do with its compatibility, making it a technical "hack".
Therefore, I will say publicly that yes JDW you are in fact right. But I am not wrong, either and I apologize for make such an inflammatory statement.
Hopefully at this point I think we agree, what Apple did here was to offer up a drive with a known issue with 64K ROMs and went ahead and marketed it for use with the stock 512K, but looked the other way and hoped nobody else noticed, because as you point out, nobody in their right mind would switch on their Mac and just leave it sitting there flashing a question mark for any length of time. So in the few seconds it took to load a disk, they gambled no one would be the wiser and if someon did call them on it, they would just play dumb. (Amazing how little seems to have changed in 21 years, just having gone through the MacBook battery recall myself). This goes to my original assertion that Apple did not support the 64K ROMs for any practical purposes following the discontinuation of the 512K (and this drive came out 6 months after that). I guess what I'm saying is I am not surprised Apple did this since it would be admitting their "hack" if they put it in writing. I think they just wanted to sell drives and figured 512K owners would eventually upgrade anyway.
Nevertheless I hope you are able to find a fix for this problem Apple clearly chose to ignore.
And by the way,I said exactly what I meant about Apple shutting down a website offering copyrighted material and I did not say they would "fly their lawyers to Europe" to shut down the site, in fact I said it was unlikely they could. However, I have been around long enough to have seen Apple shut down a lot of online sources that offered such copyrighted items, lest we forget the fantastic www.applerepairmanuals.com – I resent the implication that somehow the fact that Apple II is old means Apple won't defend their copyrights and that I am somehow overreacting. What I do remember is that as soon as applerepairmanuals.com started showing up in the usual forums, just as quickly they got shut down. Since Apple gave up support in 1998 for most of the products which manuals were hosted there, you'd think they wouldn't care. Wrong. We can start a new thread if this needs to be debated further ...
Here's an interesting development.
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2089/2181427305_1efa08245c_o.png
Then there's this:
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2289/2182513964_f968874207_o.png
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2151/2181726141_f8ef981a87_o.png
Which seems to indicate that it is compatible with ALL Macintosh CPUs. Revised 1990, perhaps Apple has forgotten about the 512K if not the 128K.
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2089/2181427305_1efa08245c_o.png
What's interesting is that the Service manual specifically notes that the 512Ke must have upgraded ROMs, which is exactly what the 512Ke is, leading me to believe they mean the drive is not to be used with a stock 512K (64K ROMs), since they don't mention the plain Mac 512K. So on the one hand you have the original manual that says it is compatible with the 512K (w/software) and on the service manual that it is apparently not. Seems like Apple changed its mind ... probably because of all the customers complaining about the constant disk access until a disk is inserted ; -)
Then there's this:
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2289/2182513964_f968874207_o.png
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2151/2181726141_f8ef981a87_o.png
Which seems to indicate that it is compatible with ALL Macintosh CPUs. Revised 1990, perhaps Apple has forgotten about the 512K if not the 128K.