Why won't floppy drives allow the LED to be replaced...?

[dabhpr]

I've tried replacing the green LED's on two different floppy drives (one Panasonic, on Mitsumi) - with blue 3 volt LED's AND tried 5 volt LED's - and both of them get "i/o error's" when they are used.... put the original LED's back in, and they work.

Why would the LED's be part of the electronics for reading the disks??

This seems really strange to me... like the drives are checking for a particular voltage drop with the LED's...

 

[punkrawket]

i've seen it done before

you sure you had the led connected correctly?

 

[jcmkk]

I think the blue LEDs draw too much amperage.

 

[RalfHutter]

I think the blue LED's will work.

I remember reading a "How-to" about just this topic in the last month or so on one of the other overclocking/case-mod sites but I can't recall which one it was.

 

[dabhpr]

I'm beginning to think I mixed up the 5V and 3V blue LED's...

And tried it (apparently) only with 3V LED's.

To my knowledge, floppy drives use 5V LED's, to I'm going to try again, with the RIGHT PART.

Wish me luck.

 

[SuperPickle]

hmm...strange. I've replaced all my drive lights with blue's and have used both 3 and 5v LED's. The only thing I notice is that the 3v are brighter probably because they are running at 5v but I've been to lazy to look it up. Anyway, I don't think voltage really should matter much and LED's draw next to nothing in amperage. Uhh...polarity issue?

 

[logrus9]

Here's an article I found

http://www.plugnpray.co.uk/modding/floppy-led/1.html

 

[LoneWolf1]

Link Fixed for the Lazy...like me

 

[SnowPunk98]

I will be doing a similar guide soon

 

[Demon-Xanth]

Check the orientation. The LEDs may be inline with a control or voltage line and either are dropping too much voltage or are reverse biased and not passing any current whatsoever. Check the voltage that the LED turns on and compare that with your other LEDs and make sure they are similar.

 

[logrus9]

<< Link Fixed for the Lazy...like me >>




Thanks, don't know how I screwed that one up.