[comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware] mfm controller problems

am42+@andrew.cmu.edu (Alexander Paul Morris) (02/04/91)

My current MFM controller got flaky on me.  It works for a few minutes
then gets Sector not found, drive not ready, ..., etc.  I went out and
bought a new one.  It's from CompuAdd, but it's a WD1006V-MM2 (Western
Digital).  Now, theoretically, all I should have had to do was pop in
the new one and all would work fine.  I know the cables are correct, the
setup is correct for the pc (cmos), except the drive always boots up
with that high pitched buzzing noise that lasts for about 2 seconds and
repeats about 20 times and the gets a Drive error.  I've tried just
about everything but to no avail.  What could be the problem?  The old
MFM is one of the older full-length models.  When I plop it back in, the
hard disk boots up fine again (at least for a couple of minutes until it
gets flakey again).  PLEASE HELP!!!  Could there be some special
switches to set or something?  I also noticed that it seemed like Disk
Master was able to access the drive and was willing to do an init on it,
but I have it filled with data and I'm not going to reinitialize the
drive.  But is it possible that I may have to.  Could it be some MFM
controller discrepency that requires that I reinit the hard disk because
timing is slightly different or something?  Thanks for any help...

    Alexander Morris                  "People die, things change...
    Carnegie Mellon                             It's sad."