prindle@NADC.ARPA (07/20/84)
Two symptoms almost always point to head misalignment on the 1541: 1. Attempting to load from a disk formatted on an aligned drive (for example, commercial software) produces much flickering and flashing of the red led acompanied by much movement of the head back and forth; a normal load should keep the drive light on continuously and the head should only move a track or two every 10 seconds (I'm not talking copy protected stuff here, just a straight load). 2. Attempting to format and subsequently read/write your own diskette is completely successful; however, others report nothing but grief when they try to read a diskette you've given them. A third symptom, failure of the Commodore "PERFORMANCE TEST" when attempting to read/write track 1 is an indication that either the alignment has slipped nearly a full track or the mechanical stepper motor stop has slipped. This is usually accompanied by a change in the sound the drive makes at the beginning of formatting (the stepper motor doesn't bounce back into it's detent after bumping the stop). In any case, your choice is to spend $50 to get it re- aligned at your local computer rip-off joint (the alignment will probably last as long as it did the first time), or do it yourself. Commodore sells an alignment disk set that requires an oscilloscope and costs $150. I just ordered an alignment disk set from C.S.M. Software in Crown Point, Indiana, and will report on it in the future, after I have seen it in action. You can also align by the empirical method (called hit-or-miss) which has taken me 3 hours on two separate occasions- there are a number of interacting factors. Good luck. Frank Prindle Prindle@NADC.ARPA