Does it work correctly in DOS?

Removing the devices in Device Manager is usually worth a shot.

Any luck yet? Incorrect cable orientation is the usual culprit, or failing to select the correct 5.25" FDD type in BIOS. But you've probably done all this so...

the LS-120 was probably on an IDE port, so you are probably trying to use the 2 floppy for the first time. Is it enabled in the BIOS?

Still having the issue. Triple checked cable orientation. Tried several cables. The floppy drives are definatly enabled in BIOS. I ended deciding I needed to start over and reformatted the hdd. Unfortunitly that was a poor move since now I can't boot/install dos. I get a "not a system disk" error. So now I suspect either the floppy drive was bad the whole time or my floppy drive controller is corrupt. Though even if the drive was bad it still should of showed up in windows?

What about the floppy disks? Did you format them on that machine? DOS, W95a, W95osr2? There can be format issues there. Are you able to boot off the 3.5" FDD?

tincup wrote:

What about the floppy disks? Did you format them on that machine? DOS, W95a, W95osr2? There can be format issues there. Are you boot off the 3.5" FDD?

the disks work fine, I've used them on many, many computers.

see, the motherboard is new. i previously was using a different slot one mb but it only supported 1 fdd drive and didn't have enough PCI slots for what I was doing. I found this new ABIT board and basically did a straight swap. I was assuming that's why I was having the floppy issues so I just figured id stop being lazy and reformat and reinstall windows and all those damn drivers. unfortunately even after the reformat I'm having floppy issues leading me to think this new board has a bad floppy controller or my disk drive randomly died.

Actually I had a floppy drive go bad once, so maybe it's the case.

Or even just a bad cable.

collector wrote:

Or even just a bad cable.

i tried 3 different cables

Hmmm, it just refuses to run 2 drives. I set it for the 3 1/2 drive and no B drive and I can get it to work now with just an A drive. I was able to install DOS 6.22. If I hook up the 5 1/4 drive and set it all up bios the 5 1/4 drive works but the A does not. I just get abort, retry, fail errors though n boot up both drives are boot checked. I'll try hooking up the ls-120 again and only keep the 5 1/4 on the floppy and see if that works at least in dos. If it does I'll try reinstalling windows and hope it doesn't throw the error again, if not I'll be looking for a new slot 1 board.

soviet conscript wrote:

I was able to install DOS 6.22.

To be clear, for testing purposes booting off a DOS boot floppy (or even a bootable Win9x CD-ROM) will work just as well as "installing" DOS.

Jorpho wrote:

soviet conscript wrote:

I was able to install DOS 6.22.

To be clear, for testing purposes booting off a DOS boot floppy (or even a bootable Win9x CD-ROM) will work just as well as "installing" DOS.

Well, did you know old Mcdonald was a really bad speller?

...You lost me completely there.

When I asked in my first post "Does it work correctly in DOS?", I was trying to ask if it worked correctly after rebooting into MS-DOS mode, or (if necessary) booting from a floppy – especially since you were talking about reinstalling Windows.

Jorpho wrote:

...You lost me completely there.

When I asked in my first post "Does it work correctly in DOS?", I was trying to ask if it worked correctly after rebooting into MS-DOS mode, or (if necessary) booting from a floppy – especially since you were talking about reinstalling Windows.

it was a joke, you must not watch much TV, I don't either acually so...

anyways

to answer your question, yes. sort of. I cannot get 2 floppy drives to work in DOS BUT i can get the 5 1/4 drive and a ls-120 to work in dos. btw my ls-120 is detected as drive B. is this determined by the poition of the drive on the IDE chain? as of now its slave to a ZIP drive.

as for Win 95 NO. I just tried reinstalling and after it installed and restarts I get the same error on reboot

"while initializing devise IOS: Windows protection error." If i disconnect the LS-120 Windows loads up fine but...im still stuck with one floppy drive.

now, if I disconnect the ls-120 and connect my floppy drives. 5 1/4 as B: and 3 1/2 as A: Its all set up in BIOS correctly. They both are detected on boot. in windows all that shows up is the 3 1/2 drive as drive A: if i reboot into DOS mode for some reason the 3 1/2 floppy drive is now B: and A: just gives a abort, retry, fail error. WTF?

also there is a "switch floppies" option in BIOS. if I enable this and boot into windows my 5 1/4 inch drive is now A: drive and the 3 1/2 drive is nowhere to been seen. interestingly if I do this the 5 1/4 drive icon is still a 3 1/2 drive icon.

I just re-potted one of my retro rigs in a new case and "revisited" this same issue all over again. Before breaking down the old build I made a diagram of the cable arrangement and where the red wire was in relation to things, but somehow I must have made bad notes since I had A:/B: issues on re-boot. After figuring out I made a mess of my notes, by trial and error I got it up and running again: 3.5" FDD= A: and 5.25"=B:

It made a difference which free end plugged into the motherboard, which to the 3.5" FDD [end of the cable]. It's not obvious with some cables where the 2nd plug is in the exact middle of the chain,which is the mobo end. For my setup this worked:

3.5" FDD: Plug 1 with red wire towards the power connector, set as 2.88mb drive in BIOS
5.25" FDD: Plug 2 with red wire away from the power connector
Mobo ASUS 3FB: Plug 3 with red wire facing towards the PCI slots

It all made sense when I was finished, though I don't remember having needed to set the 3.5" drive to 2.88mb before...

there's the option of reinstalling windows, but double check the drive, it might be bad. floppy controller might be the culprit as well.

tincup wrote:

I just re-potted one of my retro rigs in a new case and "revisited" this same issue all over again. Before breaking down the old […]
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I just re-potted one of my retro rigs in a new case and "revisited" this same issue all over again. Before breaking down the old build I made a diagram of the cable arrangement and where the red wire was in relation to things, but somehow I must have made bad notes since I had A:/B: issues on re-boot. After figuring out I made a mess of my notes, by trial and error I got it up and running again: 3.5" FDD= A: and 5.25"=B:

It made a difference which free end plugged into the motherboard, which to the 3.5" FDD [end of the cable]. It's not obvious with some cables where the 2nd plug is in the exact middle of the chain,which is the mobo end. For my setup this worked:

3.5" FDD: Plug 1 with red wire towards the power connector, set as 2.88mb drive in BIOS
5.25" FDD: Plug 2 with red wire away from the power connector
Mobo ASUS 3FB: Plug 3 with red wire facing towards the PCI slots

It all made sense when I was finished, though I don't remember having needed to set the 3.5" drive to 2.88mb before...

was it a 1.44mb drive that you had to set as 2.88mb in order to make it work?

soviet conscript wrote:

...was it a 1.44mb drive that you had to set as 2.88mb in order to make it work?

Basically yes. Set up like that B:/5.25 went in fine and the A:/3.5 had no problems either.