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Building an Atari XF 351 with a laptop drive and a case from a 3D printer

zaxoniec 3147 6
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  • Prototype Atari XF351 floppy disk drive with SIO cable on a white surface. .

    Ot, Atari never made a 3.5" station for the 8-bit series. The XF 351 never got beyond the prototype stage. I thought I would change that ;) The choice fell on the XF551.
    I built the electronics based on a schematic from the net. New board in SMD drawn in DipTrace, ordered from JLCPCB.

    XF 551 schematic.

    Electrical schematic of Atari XF551 floppy disk drive .

    Plate.

    Close-up of a prototype electronic board with integrated circuits .

    The choice of drive from a laptop was dictated by dimensions and availability. You can still buy new stock loungers. Here I have used the drive from an IBM laptop.

    Close-up of the interior of an IBM laptop floppy disk drive. .

    I drew the housing in SketchUP.

    Design of an Atari XF551 disk drive case in SketchUp. .

    Printed from Hyper PLA on Creality K1 MAX. It could have come out better, but here I made a compromise between quality and speed. It takes over 220 minutes to print anyway.

    Prototype 3'5 inch floppy drive case for Atari with gray diagonal striped pattern. .

    SIO plug to connect the station to the Atari printed from a model from the internet.

    3D-printed SIO connector with wires. .

    I also added a module on FT232 to communicate the station with the PC and the Aspeqt program to load disk images.

    Inside view of the Atari XF 551 disk drive casing with visible cables and electronics. .

    On the back of the drive is a switch to select the station number. D1 to D4. There is a power socket and a SIO2PC USB output. The switch didn't quite fit anymore, so I dispensed with it.

    Prototype Atari XF 551 disk drive with custom-designed electronics and 3D-printed casing. .

    I also managed to get hold of a WD1772 controller, a VL1772 to be precise (unfortunately these are hard to find and quite expensive), so I installed Hyper XF, an alternative ROM to speed up the station.

    A graphic designer friend also made a sticker.
    So there you have it ;) .

    View of a prototype Atari XF351 disk drive with SIO cable on a white surface. .
    Atari XE computer and prototype disk drive XF 351 lying next to each other on a desk. .

    Cool? Ranking DIY
    About Author
    zaxoniec
    Level 14  
    Offline 
    zaxoniec wrote 190 posts with rating 834. Been with us since 2007 year.
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  • #2 21442122
    LA72
    Level 41  
    zaxoniec wrote:
    I built the electronics using a schematic from the net.


    And here it would be useful to provide a link to the author of the original.
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  • #3 21443025
    lombard1
    Level 13  
    LA72 wrote:
    zaxoniec wrote:
    I built the electronics based on a schematic from the net.
    .

    And here it would be useful to provide a link to the author of the original.


    After all, there is the author's name on the schematic, and anyone who knows how to search will find the link.
    This is a very well-known interface for the eight-bit Atari.
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  • #5 21451984
    gulson
    System Administrator  
    It came out amazingly! This looks like the original drive. Good retro design of the case and even found a sticker. The case came out pretty well, you have to take into account that there were not perfect cases in those years either.
    It makes you want to use in this climate.
    Send a parcel and I'll send a small gift.
  • #6 21452190
    gregor124
    Level 26  
    Link to diagram of the original:
    https://atariwiki.org/wiki/attach/Atari%20XF551/XF551_schematic.pdf
    The XF551 is a 5 1/4" station and here it is 3.5". Then I have a question, is it possible to write/read data on it in formats typical for 3.5" floppy disks, i.e. e.g. 720 kB per page, or only in formats like for a 5 1/4" floppy disk?
    I see that you have dispensed with the expansion slot, which may bother some people, e.g. if they want to use the station and a tape recorder at the same time, which mostly don't have one either.
  • #7 21456572
    ^ToM^
    Level 42  
    zaxoniec wrote:
    Prototype Atari XF351 floppy disk drive with SIO cable on a white surface. .

    .

    Looks like the original. :D .
    Brilliant!
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Topic summary

The discussion revolves around the construction of an Atari XF 351 floppy disk drive using a laptop drive and a 3D-printed case. The creator utilized a schematic for the XF 551, adapting it for a 3.5" format, as Atari never produced a 3.5" drive for the 8-bit series. The electronics were designed in SMD using DipTrace and manufactured by JLCPCB. The laptop drive, sourced from an IBM model, was chosen for its compact size and availability. The case was designed in SketchUP and printed with Hyper PLA on a Creality K1 MAX. Feedback from the community praised the design's retro aesthetic and functionality, with inquiries about data compatibility and expansion slot usage.
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