600E Floppy drive shows in my computer but none is installed

[vic485]

Hello,

I have an IBM Thinkpad 600E running Windows 98 SE that shows it have a floppy drive mapped to A: but one is not installed. It has the DVD Rom drive option, and I have looked everywhere on the laptop but cannot find a floppy disk drive anywhere. I have refreshed the operating system multiple times but it still shows up as being there and doesn't go away.

Any help would be appreciated as I have an external USB drive that I plan to have as the A: drive to play old DOS floppy games.

[rkawakami]

It's been some time since I used a 600-series with Win95/Win98 but I believe that what you are seeing is correct. The floppy drive will appear as a device but if you try clicking on it, the system will say it's not installed. It might be due to the fact that there's an external floppy port on the right side of the system and Windows may see that port as a "drive".

The 600's Ultraslimbay can hold a CD/DVD drive or a floppy. That's the only place where you can physically mount the drive.

[Kasm279]

I can confirm that the floppy drive that always appears in My Computer is for the connector on the side of the machine. There might be an option in the Configuration Utility for DOS (ps2.exe) that disables it, but I'm not completely sure.

[Norway Pad]

I have always imagined this happens because the floppy drive controller resides inside the machine. So the logic is there, but the actual drive isn't connected. I might be wrong.

[Kasm279]

That is true, but it's always there so that you can unplug and plug the drive at will. Toshiba and other machines do the exact same thing.

[fultontech]

If I remember correctly the floppy drive will always be there for win9x. I think it's because the floppy controller is included on the main board.
Prior to the 386/486 PC (i.e. XT/AT), the floppy controller and IDE controller were cards that took up a expansion slot or two.

HA! Serves me right for not reading the thread completely first. Norway Pad answered already.

[Kasm279]

You should also read the date of the last reply...

The floppy drive will be present at all times, no matter what OS the machine is running. (2000, XP also have it) As I said, it's so that you can hotplug the drive.

[vic485]

Well I did find a while ago the reason behind the drive showing up.

I did not realize that IBM had an external floppy drive port on the laptop, and the drive letter appears even if no drive is plugged into it. I actually have bought an external IBM floppy drive that works with the port