The Sinclair QL Forum

The pictured cartridge is not in great condition - the felt pad is about half worn by the look of it - this is the biggest problem facing all QL users - the felt pads are 30 years old and as soon as you try using them there is a 80-90% chance of the felt pad disintegrating.

That is a shame.

However, there is enough of the felt pad that you should be able to do something with it.

To clean the tape head, you need to open the QL (again) and use a cotton bud with some alcohol to clean the metal tape head which is at the rear of each microdrive unit. Move the cotton bud left to right (not up and down). Check the position of the rubber wheel on the left hand side of each unit at the same time

Arrgghhh!!! And, is there a way to replace that felt pad by another thing?

Dave in the USA did have 100s (if not 1000s) cut, but has now run out of material and so much was lost in the post it was not worth the time and energy.

Your only answer is to get a hold of replacement felt pads for cassette tapes and cut it down to size using a craft knife

I have some old cassettes that I don't want for anything. I can cut from the cassette and put it in the microdrive, and it would be ok, wouldn't it?

Hi Bubu

I tried that approach with old audio-tape 'pads' and it wasn't so successful.

I then tried chopping-up some double-sided sticky-pads (the sort you hang-up mirrors with) which were more effective (splicing them with a sharp craft-knife so you get two pieces both with sticky on one side.)

Good luck!

Having read all this from start to finish, it does sound like an adventure and even like a cartoon style story. Its not finished yet Bubu, so lets take stock, you have two potential problems to overcome at the moment and also two alternative outcomes you could persue.

Two Problems

• You don't know if the Microdrives are working correctly
  You don't know if the Microdrive Cartridges are any good

You have been given the correct advice on how to go about resolving both
Once you have a known working Microdrive Cartridge, this can be used to check if Microdrive 1 or Microdrive 2 are working correctly.

Lets assume all Microdrive cartridges are no good what next?

• Well you can purchase more, plead on the Forum for someone to send you one for testing

Lets assume all Microdrives are no good what next?

• Well again it maybe possible to obtain/purchase working ones (RWAP is good for that)

Alternatives?
More purchasing I'm afraid

• You can search for a disk interface and some disk drives allowing you to store your software
  You can search for a QL SD interface that replaces one of your Microdrives and uses an SD card instead

Point being all is not lost there is still someway to go yet.

My recommendation first though Bubu is to

• Get all three LEDs working, this will help with diagnosing what is going on
  Get your keyboard working by using a new membrane
  Source a known working Microdrive cartridge

If the Microdrive cartridge is known to be blanki.e. there is no data on it, then you can format it using FORMAT MDV1_ as see what happens and report back here.

You might peruse here while you (a) wait for purchases to arrive and wait for the Microdrive to finish running (that last one is tongue in cheek )

http://www.dilwyn.me.uk/docs/ebooks/olq ... rodriveuse

http://www.dilwyn.me.uk/docs/ebooks/olq ... icrodrives

OK, I'll install first of all the leds

Anyway, a question to RWAP: Were the microdrives I bought in working order before you sent them?

The microdrive cartridges? They were sold in 'as new' condition - ie a visual check to see if they had been used, but not formatted (as they would no longer be as new).

That said, I have just used my last ones of these - and not had any issues on ones I used here (apart from one cartridge), and no-one else has complained over them.

I also have the unused new old stock cartridges - which are more expensive, but unfortunately, with 30 year old media it is always a risk! Also each time the microdrive units run, especially when formatting / failing to read anything, they seem to wear down the felt pads very quickly

Dave has about 300 microdrive cartirdges for me and has replaced the felt pads on all of them (when I can get him to send them to me!)

In the meantime, Ian Gledhill has replaced the felt pads on 12 cartridges for me (using some replacement material for audio cassettes) so once I get these and see what they are like, I could send you a couple to try - it would however, be worth me putting some files onto them so that you can first test if your microdrive units can read cartridges...

Ok, Rich, so if the cartridges are not suspect, I'll try to check the microdrive unit.

Thanks!!

Received, Rich Thanks a lot!!!

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