Thinkpads Forum

I was seeking an external floppy drive for my 760XD which doesn't have one and was advised that the part number was 66G5069 which turned out to be an External Floppy Drive Caddy. Being naive I had thought this was the complete floppy drive. The part I now have is the shell (in two parts which fit together), cable and plug. How do I get the actual floppy drive mechanism to use with what I bought? I assume the mechanism fits within, there being an electrical connection there, Thanks.

Hmm.. another legacy external floppy drive query...

(ref: http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=42814)

Does your drive look like this:

http://www.thinkpads.affordanet.com/760exflop.html

Except that it is missing the actual floppy drive mechanism?

Need another HMM just for external floppy drives.......

Searched the part # on Google and about half the venders included the drive and half didn't so I looked it up in the HMM.

According to the Thinkpad HMM Vol. 4 Sept. 1997 - External Diskette Drive Box Kit 66G5069. So apparently you have exactly what it says, it's a "Box Kit". You can download the HMM from ftp://ftp.software.ibm.com/pc/pccbbs/mo ... ol4hmm.pdf

Check out www.thinkwiki.org Great site to get you up to speed on all things Thinkpad.

The floppy drive is FRU P/N 29H9230. Ebay has many, several for dirt cheap. Get one that is new.

There is be an intermediate board inside the box to plug the floppy drive into.

Yup, I have the box kit, and a couple of drives (2.88MB too!).

Bought the floppy drive mechanism, fitted it into the box kit, and it worked fine. The box kit didn't fit precisely together at one end (never could get the ends fully together) so I sealed the small gap with electrician's tape. The complexity of this arrangement and its proprietary attachment made me long for the simplicity of my Windows XP USB floppy drive.

True. When I was using the 760XD regularly, I usually avoided using the external, and coldswapped the CD-ROM drive with the floppy if I knew I'd be using it. I had always wished the opposite was possible. (Not to come until the External UltraBay2000, IIRC)