Floppy Drive Advice

[Jay West]

Alexandre wrote....
>    - There is NO need of having the SECOND drive set on BIOS. In DOS you 
> can access it whenever it is set or not
>    - There is an area on the system which lists the second drive. You can 
> config it with some debug time
>    - You can always use a switch that interchanges DRVSEL0 with DRVSEL1. 
> It is a DPST switch you can wire easily.

I noticed on the FDC on the mainboard, there's maybe 2 or 3 pins that are 
noticably absent from the normal connector. Perhaps they absconded with the 
signals. I know absolutely nothing about the floppy drive interface & cable 
signals. However, I need to build a custom cable anyways (as the existing 
cable has an odd placement of the connectors, causing major twists in the 
ribbon cable to get them right). I did notice that when powering up the 
system, the 3.5 floppy drive light flashes for a moment but the 5.25 drive 
never flashes. On an Old Tyme mainboard, this exact cable situated as it is 
now - definitely worked for both drives.

>    - Of course you can keep both cables outside the computer and switch 
> them manually :)
Uggg. And mess up my nice rackmount Herc setup? No way ;) I recently added a 
wireless bridge/switch to the rack, so that I can get internet to the thing 
down in the basement from my wireless router upstairs. That part works like 
a champ. Once this is all done, I'll have to look for a TCP stack for DOS. I 
think Trumpet Winsock was strictly a windows thing. But perhaps DRDOS (full 
install, not minimal) has support for this. But not thinking I'll find a 
packet driver for a modern mainboard on-board NIC. I was also thinking of 
putting a third partition on the drive, for those few times when I 
absolutely must boot up windoze for some reason or another.

>    Would you mind trying the first option? I have no setup ready-to-go 
> that I could use to verify it to you
It will be a few days before I can try this option. Wife has a big "to-do" 
at our house so the next couple days will be honey-do's to get ready for it. 
Then I can get back to it and try. If not, perhaps someone can give me the 
pinouts or diagram of how to lash up a cable that that connects to the 
mainboard, lets drivesel go to the switch, and then hits the 5.25 edge-card 
connector and the 3.5 IDC connector.

I have an IBM terminal question, but I'll start a new subject for that 
solicitation ;)

Best,

J