CompuServe Thread

#External disk drive

5 messages in this thread
#193046From: Barry MassoniApr 17, 1995 8:34 PM
When I bought my A500 years ago, I also bought an A1010 drive. The "manual" that came with it said that you shouldn't cascade A1010s together as they would put to much strain on the power supply. It said to use an external drive with it's own power supply if you wanted to use more than 1. I've called several dealers looking for such a drive, but nobody has one-or has ever heard of one. Were such drives made? If they were, what were they called? Has anyone had any experience with putting more than a singal external floppy on an A500? Can they be cascaded without damaging the power supply? In a worst case situation, I could always cobble up a supply for the first drive in the system, since they only seem to want +5 and +12 V., but I'd like to avoid that if it isn't needed. Yes, I'm using the stock A500 power supply, and it's driving the computer and a Supra RAM with 4 megs of memory. Barry
#193111From: Don Curtis/SYSOPApr 17, 1995 11:38 PM
Barry, Yes…that'd be too much for the power supply…best to build one up, and if you can…use it for both external drives. Don
#193121From: Barry MassoniApr 18, 1995 1:48 AM
Thanks for the information, Don. I can't find any specs on the power supply for the A500. Do you know them off hand? Actually, it would be better to know the power requirments of the drives. I've found a great deal on +5/+12 switching power supplies, but don't know wether one will be enough for two drives (12V 2.6A), 5V 1.8A). Barry
#193322From: Don Curtis/SYSOPApr 18, 1995 11:47 PM
Barry, Sorry…I don't remember the specs on the power supply, only that it's barely capable of running the 500, let alone two external floppies and the added RAM you say you have. Don
#193517From: Barry MassoniApr 20, 1995 7:44 AM
Thanks anyhow, Don. I think the power supply is 5 amp. What I needed to know was the draw of the disk drives. One had it printed on the bottom-260ma, way below the power supply I'm going to use. Barry