Date   : Sun, 30 Dec 2007 14:40:44 -0000
From   : bbcmailinglist@... (Ian Wolstenholme)
Subject: Technomatic Disaster

It wouldn't be Christmas at the BeebMaster household without some
great disaster befalling one of my prized items.  This year it's the
Technomatic Winchester Disc.  I was using it very happily on Friday afternoon
and left it for about an hour and when I came back I got no response.  I
turned it off and on again and any number of *ADFS, *MOUNT etc. commands
just go straight to the floppy drive.

I have taken it to pieces and tested it as much as I can.  The disc itself spins
up OK and the Adaptec controller board appears to be working - the LED blinks
in concert with the drive light during initialisation.  The Akhter host adapter
board reports normal seeming voltages when tested with a multimeter.  I've
tried a different Winchester disc with no success and also a different ribbon
cable to the 1MHz bus of the Beeb as the original cable did have a bit of
damage which I was hoping was the problem.

Can anybody suggest anything else?

Best wishes,



Ian