Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!ames!pasteur!ucbvax!decwrl!mtwain.dec.com!macdonald
From: macdonald@mtwain.dec.com (Paul MacDonald - CUP/ML - 223-3439)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: My Two Cents ...
Message-ID: <8805271410.AA14234@decwrl.dec.com>
Date: 27 May 88 14:10:25 GMT
Organization: Digital Equipment Corporation
Lines: 44

>|Subject: Re: Commodore Flame  (One Blue and One Brown Eye)

>|Enough already! I suppose if you ever blew a capacitor on your motherboard
>|you would want a replacement with the same color and case style. You know
>|how awful boards can look when all the little caps don't match!


I think a number of folks miss the point on this issue of different 2010
drives for the Amiga 2000. The big problem appears to be not with the slight
differences in the bezels, but with the lack of understanding of the
problem on CBM's part. Case in point - my Amiga 2000 came to me with a
Chinon drive installed. [I may have the following part numbers wrong, but
you'll get the drift] The part number of the installed drive was FB-1036,
with a connector plug on the right side [facing the front of the drive]. The
2010 I purchased from the local dealer was also a Chinon with the model
number F-1036E. A slightly different bezel, but what the heck. Unfortunately,
the connector for this drive was on the far left of the drive [facing the
front of the drive]. The 4 pins for the power connector were opposite the
pin layout on the default drive. Well, as one USENET observer pointed out
in an earlier reply, the floppy drive cable supplied in the A2000 simply
does not reach bewteen the two drives due to the fact that the connectors
are on opposing ends of the backs of the drives. A really STUPID design
mistake. Sure, the chap from CBM that posted the above reply will say,
"Why  don't you just switch the two drives?" Well, you can, but unless you
are astute enough to know that the power connector is upside down on the 
default drive, chances are you will blow out the drive by plugging the
connector in upside down. By the way, there is no documentation that
explains installing or deinstalling the existing drive. The 2010 
instructions explain only the connector and pin-outs of the F-1036E
type drives.

So, for all you folks who jumped the case of the poor guy who was complaining
about the two different bezels on his floppy drives, take a step back, and 
then a closer look at the other issues mentioned here. Its a serious design
flaw for the majority of the non-hardware-techie consumers who are trying
to plug in a second drive with a cable that doesn't reach! And, if one calls
CBM Tech Support, they don't understand the problem. Guess, all their machines
have floppy drives with the connectors on the same side.

Regards,

Paul

[I bought two NEC drives - I like the little dust flaps!]