Disk change signalling issue (pin 34), I can't really help you finding the root cause except trying different drives and IO controllers to see if you find a culprit.

In the meantime, some quick workarounds:

- press ctrl+C on your keyboard, then DIR again (should refresh content)
- add this to your config.sys

DRIVPARM=/d:0 /f:7

d:0 = drive a:, f:7 = 1.44MB. Omitting the /C flag tells the system your drive does not support disk change signalling and it should work.

More info about DRIVPARM there: http://www.manmrk.net/tutorials/DOS/help/drivparm.htm

Can dis be possible related to a faulty cable as well?

yeah, I guess I kinda skipped that part 😁 you're using a proper twisted floppy cable? only a single drive after the twist? apart from that, a physical problem with a ribbon cable should be pretty obvious from visual inspection, they're pretty dumb. but if you have another one at hand, doesn't cost much to try another one.

Also possible that a jumper (to enable the disk-change signal) has been misplaced on the disk drive. Especially if the drive was bought elsewhere and not originally part of the system.

A lot of later 3.5" drives come with permanently soldered links instead of jumpers for settings like that, since there was no real reason for the manufacturers to change the default PC settings... but earlier drives may well have a jumper block.

Doubt its a drive jumper worked before only opted to use my cf flash card in the machine i stead of a dying drive why the need to re install .
Will have a look @ the cable if it somehow got damaged got spares of that if that is in-fact the case

If it's a 5.25" drive, wipe the connector with alcohol. It might have some dirt or residue that's preventing proper connection. If it's a 3.5" drive, ensure all connector pins are in good standing and not bent or broken.

Tried a few new drives and cables same problem, added normal drive back problem was gone note sure if the cf card is the problem but without it . Works like it should

Installed Dos 6.22 + 3.11 without any problems

Really wanted to use the CF Card o well might actually be the converter card as well its one of those that uses the whole port with bi chance of a slave with it

Aokiji wrote on 2024-04-09, 17:09:

Tried a few new drives and cables same problem, added normal drive back problem was gone note sure if the cf card is the problem but without it . Works like it should

The CF card might indeed be the problem. This is one of the very strange designs in the IBM AT: The ISA I/O port 3F7h is shared between the hard disk controller and the floppy controller. The hard disk controller is supposed to drive bits 0 to 6 (for diagnostic purposes), while the floppy controller is supposed to drive bit 7 with disk change information. As IDE is designed in a way that the IDE device (the CF card in your case) is connected to the ISA bus (maybe via some buffer chips, maybe quite directly), it's possibly that the CF card, which (as all IDE disk devices) emulates a classic AT hard drive controller drives all 8 bits on every read access, and your IDE interface card asserts the chip select signal for reads from port 3F7 to the CF card. If the IDE interface card just forwards all data bits from the IDE cable to the ISA bus, the CF card and the floppy controller will conflict at the very moment you try to read the disk change signal.

Ah that makes sense quite interesting as well will def note that for future reference 😀 , now i wonder if similar problem will be experienced with one of those SD to ide converters

You might try a different IDE Interface Card as well. Maybe another one will not respond to 3F7 at all.

Can try that as well got another to test with , the one i was using was onboard controller