hellerst@hellerst.almaden.ibm.com (Joe Hellerstein) (02/18/91)
The following problem has me concerned. Any advice would be much appreciated. The internal floppy drive on my platinum Mac Plus (c. 1988) has begun making bad noises upon inserting and ejecting diskettes. The noise sounds pretty much like a bunch of paperclips being shaken up in a tin can. I would attribute this to the eject mechanism except that it also happens when I insert diskettes. I opened the thing up and had a look at the drive, and there were no obvious loose pieces or anything like that. Inserting and manually ejecting diskettes from the dismembered drive appeared to look normal. The problems began while I was backing up my hard disk. After each disk the drive was making a sound I had never heard it make before, sort of a more intense version of its usual busy sounds. (I suspect this is unrelated) Then on one disk the drive didn't quite succeed in ejecting the disk, so I helped it out with a pin. Upon inserting the next disk the "loose part" noise began. The drive appears to be working fine, outside of the strange noise. If anyone has any pointers on how to fix this, or whether I need to take it in to a real reapir person (I'm handy, but by no means an expert) I'd appreciate the advice. Thanks a lot in advance. Joe Hellerstein