How to make a cool Commodore 1541 disk drive
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 26 พ.ค. 2019
- Commodore 1541 drives run really hot. Let's fix that by swapping out the old linear power supply for a switching supply, and let's do it for just a few dollars.
PSU from AliExpress:
UPDATE Link Removed: This PSU doesn't provide proper regulation on the 12v rail. At idle it's about 13.6v while under load (Drive spinning) it's fine around 12v. I don't recommend you use this particular PSU and use something else. Something with better 12v regulation when 5v is under load. Thanks to viewer Jim for letting me know about this issue!
JiffyDOS:
store.go4retro.com/jiffydos-ke...
Music:
Quincas Moreira - Blue Macaw
Bad Snacks - In the Atmosphere
Asher Fulero - Timelapsed Tides
Ramses B - Every Cloud
Eveningland - Escape
Geographer - Sky Skating - วิทยาศาสตร์และเทคโนโลยี
My first electronics repair was a 1541 power supply. There was a burnt trace near the rectifier and the rectifier was burnt. In process I managed to break the fuse holder so I replaced it to! This was 31 years ago, I was 9 year old kid begging Mom to take me to Radio Shack for a soldering iron and a few parts. The good days when Radio Shack still had some parts to get through a project like mine.
Great idea! Back in the day, fans glued to the top of 1541's, right above those voltage regulators, were pretty common and pretty unsightly.
great idea Adrian. I am a electrical engneer but i am still marveld how mutch progress we made in the last 30 years
@@adriansdigitalbasement many of the things we us today with out a seconde thought was 30 40 years ago pure science fiction
Thanks for the inspiration. Based on your video I replaced my 1541 power supply with a Mean Well RD-50A dual output switching power supply CH:1 5Volts, 6A CH:2 12 volts, 2A. The drive runs very well and is much cooler, (and much lighter). Thanks again.
Great job Adrian! Nice to see creative means to keep these classics up and running. over 35 years later!
Great video. I'd seen this mod documented in blogs before, but this is the first time I've seen it performed on a video. Awesome job. Will definitely try this out in the future.
what a great mod. I can't believe nobody else has thought to do a video like this before. Thank you.
Gday
i use to keep my coffee warm in winter on my 1541
cheers
That's a nice MOD! I have quite a few working 1541's that I repaired last year. I prefer SD2IEC myself because of the space savings and because floppies due to their age are not very reliable. From time to time I will pull the old units out to verify they are still functional, repair them if they are not then promptly put them back into storage as they are part of my collection and I keep them stock. If I were to use them all the time I would change the PSU out in a heat beat but as a collector keeping what I have as original is more to preserve them as they originally were.
Thank you for the update on the description!
All the best for you new career as a content creator!
I just got one of these along with a C64, VIC 20, and some accessories in a big box from a friend. Definitely going to try this mod. Keep up the good work!
Thank you for the video, Adrian. I was finally able to get my 1541 fixed. Took a while to get that part but all worth it. Cheers, Sir! Keep up the great videos....
This was the main advantage the 1541-II had over the original 1541. By making the power supply external, all of that heat (and weight) was removed from the drive itself.
I love this type of mods... Old devices with new age parts...
For example, I love the IDE/FlashCard replacements.
Great job!
Ha! That's damn clever.
My go-to solution for 1541's in the past has always been to get the 1541-II instead, but obviously that's not really a solution. This upgrade is very nice, can't believe I never thought of that before.
Thanks, keep up the great work. :)
That's interesting to me. I'm trying to convert all my commodore disks to .D64 format to run on PC (And then get rid of everything). I have 3 1541 drives, 2 don't work and one seems to be giving errors when it gets hot... So possibly I'll purchase a 1541-II to download anything I missed (I got most of it) and then turn around and sell it when I'm done.
Really amazing stuff. I remember waiting for 3 months for this drive while there was a shortage/back order.
Just wanted to say I love your videos, I still have my C64 working,. Keep up the great work
That’s a brilliant upgrade. And now that you’ve done it, makes perfect sense.
I wouldn’t be surprised if even that cheap PSU is delivering cleaner 5/12v too.
Those old power supplies actually deliver super clean power vs. a switching power supply -- but only as clean as the AC power in the mains is. The problem with those old linear power supplies is as they get old and go out of spec they fail toward delivering overvoltage and cooking whatever they're powering.
Thank you for another awesome video... Love all your videos. Very enjoyable and learned a lot.
Very clever update! Perfect solution for saving some old 1541's
4:40 - pro tip, use an awl to help you guide your drill :)
Dude, you are amazing, I love that you just go in, poke around, think a little and come up with all the solutions!
just another awesome thing i wanna try out. cant thank you enough for these fun and nice explanation videos.. suggestion for further projects: put in jiffy dos.. dos id 8,9,10,11 switch dial. track/sector display ;)
Thanks for the inspiration ; just did the same to my drive. Only difference; instead of soldering the PSU to the board, I reused the connector, and replaced the bridge and regulators with 'jumpers'
Yep. Will definitely give this mod a go at some point on my 1541 drives.
The transformer went open circuit primary on my 1541 many years ago but I had bought a couple of Astec SMPS units at a Ham rally and one was just waiting for an opportunity to be used. Those PSU's were a good deal larger than your small unit so the metalwork had to be modified so the SMPS could be fitted. Needless to say it was successful and weight and heat greatly improved. It is still working today.
And of course, another great video. Cool idea (pun intended). I may take a look at this further down the road. Gotta get my 1541 working first.
I like that ypour more recent videos are edited more and more focused.
That's the video i was looking for :) Thanks Adrian
Thank you! Saved my 1541 following this vid!
Reeeally an awesome mod to let the good old 1541 live longer! I'll go for it, too. Cheers, M
I started this video thinking I wouldn't do this with any of my drives, and ended thinking "Yeah, that is pretty dang good"
I have 3 1541s and one 1541C.... I might just do this on them all.
Great video!
Nice job. I love these kinds of mods.
Hey Adrian.. super clever upgrade!
Glad I seen this! Just got a 1541 and whooo it's a toasty boy! Wanna do this modification to mine now!
Great idea and execution. That’s going to save a lot of electricity. Basically that mod is helping to save the planet!
This is good! A modern upgrade can help to ease the pain, also the recycled transformer can put to good use for somewhere switching can't fit (high frequency noise).
Nice video! I'm gonna try this with a 1551 drive.
I like how you used kill-a-watt to calculate heat. For one of my projects, I used nichrome wire with a variable PWM to make telescope objective lens heaters. To test how much heat was going through I used kill-a-watt to test if it worked and how much heat was going through. Then I marked the dial for the different heaters I made (and one I purchased).
Very nice project, thanks for sharing with us.
I used to laugh at these and say they were like a lawn mower where you would pull a cord to start it they were so big and hot.
Loved my 1541-II and 1571
@ungratefulmetalpansy especially if you ran a BBS with that.
I had an external HARD DRIVE for mine (yes, they did exist) Granted it was only 10 MBs, but 10 MBs back then was a lot, especially considering that C64 programs don't actually take up a hell of a lot of space.
Ninja vagina ..so you were never very funny then i guess
Great job! Well done!
Impressive modification!
Hi Adrian good job as always, but you may want to get a little powerful switcher like 1.5-2A for both 5V and 12V as 1A is a bit a too tight limit for a typical 1541 :)
Love this. Now, I just need to get all of my 1541's running and then I'll do this.
The heat dissipated by a linear regulator is the voltage drop across the regulator times the current passing through it.
Sweet! I just run a 12v fan from 5v over the regulators. Less effective of course, but also less invasive. The fan keeps the temperature in the ok range, however I might just try this approach on my main drive.
Great idea. Thanks for sharing!
In my 1541c I fitted a Mean Well (amazing name!) RD-65A power supply, a bit over-rated for the job at a total power of 66 watts (RD-35A or RD-50A probably better options), but is a much higher quality, yet still very affordable, unit that is about the same size as the transformer and has far better regulation than the original (or an aliexpress special) power supply, I used 3M VHB foam tape (sticks like brown stuff to a blanket) to affix it inside the unit so no drilling needed, and it runs cool as a cucumber as a result... :)
In Europe, the 1541's came with a way to wire the transformer primary for 240V or 220V. Mostly they were factory wired for 220V which was very common. Many EU countries have unified their supply to 230V. It has been found that mostly the 1541 works just fine and with good regulation margins even if wired for 240V in a 230V network, and will readily dissipate notably less heat. I'm not sure if the Americas market had drives with 110V or 120V options or others.
The first VIC20's had a similar problem, with a 9VAC supply only, and internal rectification and regulation. They ran hot. The newer style power brick solved this problem, and was then beefed up for the C64. Despite being pin compatible, the new style VIC20 brick must not be used on a C64 because it will not meet the power demand. The other way around is OK.
Great jo, man! I have a 1541 were the internal powersupply failed with a little flame, smoke and a nasty smell as a result. Gave up on it but of course never through it out (that would almost be sacriligious). If no other important parts died - this solution might be my solution. Thanks!
12W quiescent power consumption? This is crazy!
Nice to see you take care of this issue.
And that's only one disk drive... it's not about the 1702 wich will take even more like 50-90W just for showing a blurred screen.
To be fair, it is running a whole computer inside the disk drive. Processor is running at 1 Mhz just like the C64. Also, my 1702 isn't blurry at all...in fact it is so crisp I can use 80 column mods and read it with no issues at all. If I plug it into a TV on the other hand, all bets are off and you do get smearing colors.
@@peterlamont647 Well, that's because composite video sucks. You can mod a TV to accept RGB signal, which would eliminate color smearing. The 8-Bit Guy had a video about doing such a mod
@@Sheevlord I think you mean the RF signal sucks. Even with composite RGB, TVs have a conical pixel shape and the color burst is encoded into the luma signal. So no matter what it will look smeary and shadowy. Sony trinitrons have the best CRT quality of TVs as far as I know and probably could eliminate most of that effect. However, the average TV has smears and shadows(the engineers calling it ringing). The 1702 was specifically designed to map color pixels, hence it is more crisp than a regular TV. 8-bit guy copied another youtuber if he did an episode on that too lol. I think Adrian Black did it, or akbkuku.
Wait, do you mean RGBi like a 9 pin?? Becsause if you separate the colors and process them independently that is a major job for a hobbyist to do lol. I'd love to see that video!
Aw, Great Show, Adrian! Every such mod reminds me of a legendary Commodore heavy-weighty "reliability". As for "keeping it up" with an "All-in-one" design - I think that an external power supply brick is a bit more useful, but compared with Your "internal" economical mod - is a discussible issue.
Very nice and neat project, I love these kind of renewals.
I think you could save a couple watts removing the rest of the rectifier circuit.
Stefano Crespi I believe he bypassed those so there shouldn’t be any power going to them anyway.
great video. keep up the good work
Using this method I was able to fix a vic-1541 longboard model I set aside years ago that had a voltage problem due to corrosion on the board and components near the power supply connector. I did have to remove the rectifiers and everything else in that area of the board that Adrian left there. On mine, that stuff was bringing voltage of the new PSU down to 4.75 and the drive didn't work right. One removed I had 4.82 and normal operation.
Great mod, I've put it on my list of to do's 👍
Good job. The "purists" will go mad though XD.
PS: I think it will be wise to take off the remains of the rectifier circuit as well
@@voltare2amstereo Yeah, I know, but just for the sake of weight reduction I would take them off as well. Those parts might be quite useful for other projects.
I would worry about equipment damage from using cheap power supplies. Those transformers were built to last. If the power supply died, though, I wouldn't see a big problem doing something like this as a repair.
If you're a purist, you probably shouldn't even power any of this gear on. Preservation and use don't go hand in hand.
The Original Gamer switch mode PSUs tend to fail low or no voltage. The old C64 PSUs were notorious for killing C64s when they died.. I know the disk drive isn’t the same, but probably fails in the same manner.
There is NO way the rectifier and transformer were better, even with cheep parts rectifiers from the 80s. Can leak, fail, etc... They also went with cheeper options for cost.. if anything the PSU he put in was no worse. Only thing I would have done different was replace the slow blow with a new fuse after running it on the scsi. Great work!
i remember putting a fan on top of mine back in the day...
and i have been thinking about this mod if i ever get a new C64 to play with
Well i just got a new C64 :D and im going to do this 100%
THX, this was what i was looking for. Great!!
Nicely done!
great content and nice job. Greetings from Steven from the Netherlands
Adrian, this is an excellent mod. I have a 1541, that works almost fine, but only almost. I suspect the big capacitors. I have ordered those from China, which will take a long time. Now, I think, I might as well replace the whole power supply section. Those standard power supply connectors are a great idea, too. The extension cables are dirty cheap an I probably have then in stock. Thumbs up from me 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻
Wow great work :) Thank you for this video.
Great video! Nice music choice.
When I first bought mine back in 1982. It would overheat and freeze all the time. I cut out the fins and added screen. Then cut the top off an old air freshener and turned it upside down. I used a block of foam with a hole cut into it for the airfreshener fan. And all was fine after that.
That was fantastic! I'm glad that you improved old tech to allow them to be more efficient. Now do the same to a c64 and eliminate the brick 😁
Simple and easy. If I ever get around to buy an actual 1541, this would be about the first thing I would do...
Though, I think I will be just using an SD2IEC ;)
Hella sweet mod! I always like when newer, more efficient and reliable PSUs are retro-fitted into old hardware.
Nice upgrade
I studied a bit the heat issues on the 1541 long ago, because reading issues. The drive heated up so much reulsting in poor aligment due to expansion. To make it worse, the ROMs started to read corrupted data due the high temperature inside baked by the transformer. I discovered that 1 hour was the longer you could keep the drive powered on before geting issues and un summer times just 30 minutes. As a result of extensive heat more and more read errors ocurred and head keep banging to track zero until it missaligned itself. I turned off the drive instantly on head knocking to avoid further issues. Waited an hour or so to let the drive cool down. It read like new. So many tasks like formating and writing programs should be done with a cold drive. Fitting a linear psu with transformer below the board .... what a funny idea
Awesome video
You really into the old computers - no problem
Best retro mod ever
An easy way to ensure that you drill exactly where you need you should look at buying a set of center drill bits, they have a 5 pack of various sizes on ebay which vary in price between about $6 to $8 depending on the seller, but they all ship from the US. Since you have a drill press these would help out quite a bit, machinists use them for their precision and they don't flex! Even if you have to drill a larger hole these give you a starting point that will not allow a standard bit to wander and they can last decades if properly stored they are also made of high speed steel so they are way harder than the material they are being used on!
Another tip which I have done to add an additional fan to my 3d printer is to buy a JST XH Connector set and I bought a SN-28B Pin Crimping tool, it allows you to add plugs to any wires as well as the kit providing the actual connector for the board, the crimping tool is a must have when replacing or adding many types of pins for a project it even works on some types of molex connector pins! In my case I wanted to add the fan without patching the wires, in my case it only requires wire long enough to go through the loom, the connectors added to one end and replace the factory wire soldered directly to the fan!
I use thin sheet metal and fish paper to insulate and protect and shield my circuit boards. Fish paper is good stuff. I also conformal coat the boards and corona dope any high voltage / high frequency exposed lines.
Very "cool" mod that really makes sense! :)
Awesome idea! Not sure why I've never seen anyone else do this before? Seems like an obvious thing to do.
Very nice! I need to do this to mine :)
Well done!
Excellent!
Looks pretty good. If I were you, I’d replace all the caps, including the ones in the brand new supply, with good quality name brands.
ive tried this today on a vic-20 1540 very early (actually its a 1541 version)long board and it is working with a modern psu as well
Nice mod! I probably would have left the large caps on the board, though. Switching supplies can be a bit noisy, and it helps keep the voltage stable during current peaks.
Note for anyone not familiar with power supplies: These tiny, modern switching power supplies have high DC voltages in them, which can be more dangerous than the AC line voltage. Some have capacitors that can retain a high voltage charge after power is removed. Handle with care!
gotta luv switch modes
Commadore made an after market fan that attached to the 1541. I bought one for $60 in '83.
Commadore? LOL
@@user-hx9gu5nh9p Ueah, typos are hilarious. Get a life.
@@kennerthallen2132 Typos are the difference between knowing your shit and knowing you're a shit.
By the way, you made a good bargain in '83. LOL
If you want to make your drive even cooler, you can replace the MOS 6522 with Western Design Center CMOS versions W65C22N which are available at Mouser. Do NOT use the W65C22S which have totem pole output IRQB. If you can find a Rockwell R65C02 CPU, you can change that too.
Hi All, Nice video, jsut about 30 years to late for me :)
I had a brown C64 new, after saving for another 12 months i bought the hard drive hmm sorry external 1541 floppy diskette
I am pretty sure the floppy was almost the same price as the C64
Ran fine for maybe a month, but due to lack of space i ended up having it run of the desk and on my bed
Yes it stopped working
It cost me about 40-50% of the purchase price to have it fixed, when i got it back and in discussing with people, they told me about not placing it on the bed as it needed cooling and the cloth on the bed would have stopped the air flow
So it sat on a small table i picked up at a thrift shop, i think it was those 60's ashtray type tables.
Anyway one of the blokes at work ended up making these really long screws ( close to 4 or 5 inches ) the base was the same thread as the stock screws in the base of the board, but the other end was different, at the same time he had machines these small egg shaped brass blocked and has drilled and tapped them to fit into the now long screws.
I rang that set up for the next 4 or 5 years that i had the C64, eventually I purchased a Amiga 500, and they sat together and slowly the C64 ended up in the cupboard
Another friend partially solved the issue , he simply removed the internal power supply transformer and mounted into a small wood cage and rang longer cables to inside the unit
It basically worked power point >> a inline switch the same as on a typical desk lamp >> transformer >> leads to internal rectifiers
He did not fix the problem entirely like you did but removed part of the weight and heat source
With all the cable mess of a C64 setup and the factory power brick another similar item was not a issue
Regards
George
this just makes me want a soldering station more :c i wanna do projects like this!
Great video, thanks :)
That's weird. I had a 1541 for many years and never noticed that it was overly hot. Maybe I never taxed it to the max? Anyway, JiffyDos is the way to go if you are running a 1541 OR possibly one of the 1541 compatible drives that were available back in the day (I think MSD made one, for example). I had JiffyDos in my system and man, was it a life saver!
I see what you did there...
In 1984 l put in a 65C02 into my 1540 and 1541 (and Vic20). They ran a lot cooler and a bit faster.
That true?
@@jacknedry3925 The 65C02 uses a lot less power and a few instructions are about 1 clock cycle faster (6 instead of 7 clock cycles for a ROL for instance), not sure how often the 1540/1541 firmwares use those specific instructions but it could speed things up slightly.
It could also mess up timing in firmware that relies on clock cycles for time keeping...
@@someguy4915,
Hmmm... I'd like to try it if it works, But I'm not sure...
Great mod!
Interesting mod, but not quite sure I’d go the same route. There’s all that room created by pulling that transformer so one could seek a slightly bigger supply (and which should be sufficiently decent quality to produce clean DC) and then have a metal plate one could screw down onto the chassis and which would also have holes for standoffs to support the power supply. That keeps the chassis largely original. Then I’d check and see which components in the original power supply circuit can be pulled to physically isolate that from the new supply and then do pretty much the same process as Adrian did to feed the main board from the new supply.
@Adrian Black: First of all, great idea there that I might do on my own 1541. Just one thing, 12V/1A and 5V/1A look a bit tight to me. I'd prefer 1.5A for each rail myself... I am not sure why Commodore used the TO-3 versions (3 amps!) of the 7812 and 7805 regulators, but maybe all the other variants did not exist yet back then. As in 78S12 and 78S05 for 2A.But sure as h*** there were the standard 1A TO-220 types that we see all over the place.
Also your PSU model uses unknown to me elcap brands as far as I was able to see. Has me hesitant to use that in dear old 1541. Maybe with a thick protective foil for the underside of the board, in case a capacitor shoots its load upwards! xp
I'm quite sure that's the case. My old data books only know the 1A version in TO220.
Also, always keep in mind (ESPECIALLY for Commodore, many former engineers talked about that): "We have that shitload of part XY collecting dust in our storage. Stuff it in the next product somehow!".
You should have add a fan also for the new psu that way it will never even heat awsome video as always
Why? The old power supply never had a fan and it was still working after 20+ years.
That perefrial power connector is actually for a rear 120 mm fan I have one of those in my computer and it plugs into one of 3 connectors from my modular psu (3 connectors on one cable) and I can plug my 3.5 inch floppy drive into the other end and the cd rom drives into the other 2 connectors
That's one hefty power saving. The only downside is, now you've lost a mini space heater!
Great job! :)
i have that kill a watt meter, very handy.
Grate Video!