WARNING - Disconnect your equipment from the mains supply before removing the cover or any screws. In the case of computer monitors or CRT displays make sure you discharge the tube before commencing any maintenance. The information provided on these pages is for your information only - any electrical works should be carried out by a competent person. Retro-Zone.Org or any of the writers cannot be held responsible for any injury or damage caused by the use of this information.

DISCLAIMER - Retro-Zone.Org or any of the writers cannot be held responsible for any damage caused to your equipment. Use this information at your own risk - only if you feel competent to do so. Every Project here was undertaken with all possible safety precautions in place - please ensure you do the same. Before you begin any works on sensitive electronic equipment make sure you have "earthed" yourself to prevent any static charge damaging the circuits of your equipment.

 

ADDING A 3.5 INCH FLOPPY DRIVE TO YOUR AMSTRAD CPC 6128   Please note that this guide is for the CPC 6128 only and not the 6128Plus. (Also note that this guide is ongoing with more modifications available soon.)   Step 1: First thing is to get your hands on a Universal Floppy Drive Cable. These were the kind used in PC's in the early days of computing when you would still have a 5 1/2" floppy drive in your machine. It is the 5 1/2" floppy drive connector that we need (See photo to the right) as it is the same connector the Amstrad 6128 uses on the back of the computer. These cables also have 2 of more IDE connectors on them allowing us to perform additional modifications. Locate the wire on the cable marked with a colour and ensure that when inserting the cable into your 6128 that the coloured cable is on the right hand side (looking from the front of the CPC6128.)   (NOTE: Do not use a cable that has a twist in it - If your cable has around 5 wires which are twisted around in between 2 IDE connectors then this cable will not work with the Amstrad. You can however remove the connector and un-twist the wires to make the cable usable.)
	Step 2:   In order for the 6128 to recognize the new drive we need to create a "Ready Signal". This is normally transmitted by the Amstrad 3" drives, but 3.5" disk drives do not transmit a "Ready Signal".   To get around this we short out the ready signal pin on the cable. The "Ready Signal" pin is PIN 1. Locate the coloured wire again and the middle IDE connector and insert a small wire into both Pin 1 and the pin immediately below it (as shown in the photo to the left.)   This will trick the 6128 into thinking it is receiving a "Ready Signal".
Step 3:   Now to get power to the drive. There is a more in depth look at powering the 3.5" drive later on - but for now we are just going to use the floppy drive power cable from a PC (as seen in the photo to the right.)   You can either use a PC power pack for this or, as I have, you can buy an external IDE power adaptor (which came with an USB SATA to IDE converter kit) and fit the relevant plug from the PC. (You can purchase IDE power adapters from eBay.)   Most people opt for using the power pack from inside the PC.   Now is also the time to plug the IDE cable into the drive (note: depending on which cable you have managed to get, there may be a tab on the IDE connector which prevents you from inserting it into the drive. If this is the case you can remove this tab by heating up a sharp knife and cutting the tab away. Do not use any sharp or hot tools if you are under 18 without adult supervision.)
	Step 4:   Turn on your Amstrad CPC6128. If all goes well then your Amstrad welcome screen will appear as normal and your drive will light up. If your Amstrad does not start properly then you have either inserted the IDE cable the wrong way round in the drive or you have inserted the the cable the wrong way round in the CPC. If this is the case try changing them.
Step 5:   Ideally the best disks to use with the Amstrad are 720K DD floppy disks, but these are now very hard to source. The alternative is to tape over the High Density hole on a standard 1.44mb floppy disk to make it compatible with the Amstrad CPC6128.
	Step 6:   Now we need to make the disks usable. Unfortunately there is no way to Format a disk using Amstrad Basic or AMSDOS. To format the disk we need to use CPM. Insert your CPM disk into the standard drive of the 6128.
Step 7:   To access the CPM environment you need to use the command CPM.   The "" symbol is accessed on your CPC6128 by pressing the [shift] and [@] keys together.   Type in: "cpm" now (without the quotes - see photo to the right) and press the [ENTER] key.
	Step 8:   Your CPM operating system will boot up to give you the welcome screen.   Type the command "copydisc" at the A> prompt and CPM will ask you to insert the source disc into drive A and the destination disc into drive B (drive B is your new 3.5 inch floppy drive.)   Insert a blank 3" disc (or any game disc) into your 6128's standard drive and your new "taped" 3.5 inch disc into your new 3.5 inch drive and press any key.   CPM will now copy the contents of the 3" disc onto the 3.5" disc. If the 3" disc was blank you will get a blank formatted 3.5" disc - else you will get a duplicate of the game disc you used.
Step 9:   Once the copy is complete type the command "AMSDOS" to return you to the Amstrad basic screen.   Now type "b" and press the 'ENTER' key. Now type "cat" and press the 'ENTER' key.   If you copied a blank disc you will see "Drive B: user 0 163K free" If you copied a game disc you will see something similar to the photo on the right.   If you did copy a game disc you can now erase all files from your new 3.5 inch floppy drive by using the command:   era, "*.*"
	Step 10: That's It! You now have a functioning 3.5 inch floppy drive on your Amstrad CPC6128.   [go back to projects index page]