(Page last updated: 5th October 2001)
| I am in NO WAY connected to Syquest or Iomega, the following information is provided in good faith and details my experiences with this device. I have tried to ensure that this information is as accurate as possible and accept no responsibility for any damage you may cause to either yourself, your software, data or your hardware following any of the advice detailed here. (But it worked for me...) Oh Yes, I`ve got to add that following some instructions on this page will invalidate your warranty - but hey, you knew that ! This is your last ditch attempt to get the thing working right ? | |
Please note: Most
images on this page can be seen full size (typically 1290 x 960 pixels)
by right clicking on any image, selecting "Save Image
as" and can then be viewed off line, at your leisure and in much
greater detail. (This page is best viewed with Netscape.)
Problem
1: Sparq not recognised by Windows 95/98 (a simple software fix)
| Firstly you may not
even need to open your drive at all ! If your problem is that for some
strange
reason the drive has simply stopped being recognised by Windows 95/98 you
should try the following fix:
Physically remove ALL devices sharing your parallel port, then under Windows, Control Panel, System, Device manager, remove ALL parallel port devices from your system (including the Sparq drive which will show up under SCSI devices). Reboot the machine. All should be good at this stage, now re-install the Sparq physically and re-install all the Sparq software drivers etc. If you are lucky the Sparq should now be functional again. Gradually add all remaining parallel port devices to your system, each time re-checking that the Sparq is OK. This has happened to me a number of times in the past, the usual culprit is my Epson printer for some reason, however my scanner has also caused problems from time to time. If this method does not allow W95 to see the drive then it may be a damaged controller within the Sparq (have seen this once) and repair is outside of the scope of my experience as I do not have any diagrams or spares to attempt a repair. I have never owned an Internal IDE sparq drive so cannot really be of any great assistance if your drive is an internal version that is not being recognised under W95. I have heard that they prefer IRQ 7 and that an upgrade to W98 may help, but I have not had first hand experience of this. Check out the message board and other links mentioned further down this page or perhaps post a message in the newsgroup alt.syquest for assistance with Internal Sparq drive recognition problems. |
Problem
2: Drive appears completely dead
| Check the power supply
using a multimeter, be VERY careful not to short the pins together,
or to short the pins to the outside of the connector - as this is at 0
volts (Ground) as well. The voltages you should expect are as shown in
the picture opposite (Connector viewed from the front
-
please note that the numbering system I have used here is NOT
to the syquest standard. This same information can also be gained from
the label on the PSU itself, however please note that the syquest connector
label seems to use an unusual numbering system unlike any DIN connector
I have ever used in the UK, perhaps this is an American standard ??).
If the voltages are not as shown the PSU is blown. I have not had a faulty PSU yet so have not attempted a repair, however it should be possible to use any suitable PSU which can provide the correct voltages at about 1 Amp for each voltage required (an old computer PSU would be fine, but as these are quite bulky, a better option may be to fit a suitable socket to a blanking plate on the rear of your PC and use your PCs own internal power supply to provide these voltages, from a spare disk drive power connector). STOP PRESS - If you are in the US, you can buy a NEW PSU from 7-24, check out their website HERE. |
 |
| One other thing that you can check quite easily is the
PSU`s internal fuse. You will need a small "Torx security bit" with
a hole in the centre to enable you to remove the screws. The casing will
then pop apart when a screwdriver is inserted along the split in the side.
The fuse is the small black, round object that is circled in the photo opposite. It should be closed circuit when tested with a multimeter of course. There may be more than one variation of PSU as Iain Welsh who pointed out this possible quick fix had a 1Amp version fitted, whilst you can see that my PSU has a 2Amp. However the design of fuses used seems to be pretty much consistent. If the fuse is not blown and you have a knowledge of electronics it is now a matter of component testing. (as I do not have a circuit diagram) |
 |
Parallel port
to Sparq connection lead:
| The lead that connects the Sparq drive to the computer itself is nothing special, it is a standard 25 Way male to female data cable with no crossed wiring. Any standard pin for pin cable bought from a computer retailer should work, however I would go for the highest quality screened cable available. It should also be kept as short as possible. |
Drive
Disassembly:
| Before I go any further
with descriptions of what I have found out about the Sparq drive itself,
I will try and describe how to dismantle the drive, ONLY
do
this when you are sure that it is necessary to do so and that there is
no other alternative.
The drive is quite easy to dismantle, the case is simply clipped together. If you hold the drive firmly by the base and squeeze the bottom half together, you will be able to prise the two halves of the casing apart, I`d recommend trying to get the side with the power switch on to come apart first as this always seems easiest. The side oppsite the power switch is held together with a slightly different clip arrangement, see the photo opposite. (Clips are labelled "1") The front and rear panels will just fall away. Gaining access to internal drive mechanism: Only proceed with
this section when you are sure that you need to gain access to the drive
mechanism, this area must be kept as clean as possible.
|
 |
| Problem
3: Disks continually eject or never eject.
Most complaints about Sparq drives seem to centre on continuously ejecting disks, or disks not ejecting when the front panel eject button is pressed. If EVERY cartridge refuses to stay in the drive then it is quite possibly a hardware fault on the drive itself and you can try some of the things talked about further down this page.. If it only occurs with one particular cartridge then it is most likely the cartridge that is damaged and this must be scrapped. If everything points to the drive, one thing you will need to check is the EJECT BUTTON. This switch is not really up for the job it is being used for in this instance, Rick Beresford tells me that its designed operating force is 90 grams and it should be good for 50,000 operations. Just as an experiment try it yourself - get out the kitchen scales and see just how much force 90 grams is - it`s not a lot, just a very light finger press ! To inspect the switch, check that it looks like the picture shown here and that the eject front panel button can actually operate it, or in the case of a continually ejecting disk, check that the eject button isn`t pressing it in all the time. The small black piece of plastic at the front of the switch must be present, as this is what the eject button presses against, I have seen one drive where this has been snapped clean off. This switch is unusual
in that it is a "break to operate" switch. Hence in order for the
drive to be able to spin up it needs to be in a closed contact state. -
Check this with a Multimeter across the two solder blobs that can be seen
in the picture.
|
 |
| If the
switch is found to be permenantly in the open contact condition you either
need to find a suitable replacement or jumper the switch out of circuit
by soldering a wire across it`s terminals. In order to eject the disk you
can then either turn the drive off and wait for it to spin down completely
before manually removing the cartridge, or right click on the drive icon
and select "Eject" from windows. Alternatively you could use the unmount
option that is present on the syquest control panel that is optionally
installed when you installed the drive.
One other thing that is worth checking at this point is that the sliding protection cover on the disk itself is working correctly. If this device is not opening correctly the heads cannot enter the platter area and the disk will eject as a result. In my experience the drive usually sounds laboured and as if it is having difficulty spinning up to the correct speed. The protection cover is designed to protect the disc platter and opens by means of a rubber "strap" that engages with a small spring clip on the right hand side of the drive (when the loading bay is viewed from the front). I have had this happen several times, it is simply a matter of getting the spring clip to stand proud a little more by tweaking it out a bit with a small screwdriver. If you are careful you can do this through the front loading door without actually opening the drive. It also helps if you push slightly from left to right on the left hand side of the disk when inserting it into the drive, as this tends to push the disk over towards the clip, increasing the chances of correct operation. |
| Internal
IDE Version Eject button:
I am reliably informed that in the case of the internal version of the Sparq, the same type of eject button is used, however this button is located on the underside of the circuit board and on the left hand side of the drive as opposed to the right hand side. (see picture opposite) If the eject button is found to be faulty on an internal drive and is jumpered out of circuit, it will tend to present more of a problem for the user than it will on the parallel port version, as it may not be possible to use the "syquest utilities" to eject the disk. However right clicking on the drive icon will still allow the user to select "Eject" without problems. |
 |
| Problem
4: Drive Head Crash
If you suspect that you may have had a drive head crash DO NOT INSERT ANY MORE CARTRIDGES ! remove the top cover as described in the section "Gaining access to internal drive mechanism" and inspect the heads, the heads are located on the end of the swing arm. In park position the heads are separated by a plastic separator and can be inspected quite easily. They are small black pads attached to a sprung metal head mount. You should avoid touching these parts at all costs, but try and see if the heads are intact or if the connecting wire to the actual head has become detached. If the head has been ripped off and/or the connecting wire can be seen to be disconnected then I`m afraid that the drive is useless. The overall head area can be seen ringed and numbered "1" in the "Violins of death" photo below. The drive in the picture opposite has actually suffered a Head crash, the head itself has been ripped off its mounting and the electrical connecting wire can be seen, hanging in free space. As Dave Shott said
to me, the most likely cause for a head crash is removal of a disk whilst
it is still spinning, as he says, this would cause "the
leading edge of the upper head and trailing edge of the lower head to mill
into the surface of the spinning disk causing a big nasty scratch.
Final head damage occurs after the last inevitable pass. Since the heads
have become essentially "blind", they just skate across the surface never
seeing data. Mechanical misalignment without final head damage can occur
as well if the heads become unparked and the cartridge becomes disengaged
even without a spinning disk. In this case the heads simply become
"cross eyed" instead. Hence the requiem in all its glory."
The
requiem reference leads us nicely into Problem 5, the "Violins
of death"
|
 |
| Problem
5: Violins of Death
The violins referred to here is the whining sound heard on some drives as the heads are passed across the disk surface after insertion of a disk. This is quite a common fault with Sparq drives. Usually the "violins" start, the heads attempt to read the disk a few times then the disk is ejected. This has been attributed to various reasons in the newsgroups, firstly it has been suggested that both heads get inserted on the same side of the disk - I don`t agree, as this is not possible due to the construction of the swing arm mechanism (see front view photo). Another suggestion is to blow compressed air into the head area, this may help to clean the drive of dust particles and hence may well be beneficial to the drive (take care as some "Airdusters" will also give out propellant or cause condensation). I think that the problem is caused by a misalignment with the swing arm mechanism in relationship to the disk platter and some parts of the sprung metal head-mount, or mounting arm (see 1&2 of front loading bay photo below) may even be touching the platter slightly (this is probably caused due to wear or vibration caused through everyday use, the continual clunky insertion of cartridges alone is probably enough to cause the mechanism to come out of alignment eventually). I have experienced this problem with my own drive and have managed to get the drive working again by adjusting the screws shown on the photo opposite. Screw 2 has the most effect but take care with this one, as it also forms part of the swing arm bearing. This screw can be VERY stiff to turn, but as you only need to adjust it a fraction of a millimeter it should be enough. Screws 3+4 also have minor effects and may be worth trying first. Take great care when adjusting any of these screws, as you will need to make the adjustments with a disk spinning in the drive, while the heads are over the platter area, in order to know when the noise is eliminated. Therefore I would not use a cartridge that has valuable data on it ! |
 |
| The photo opposite
shows the view of the head mechanism from the front loading bay, the plastic
head separator can be seen (numbered 3) as
can the rigid upper and lower head mounting arms of the swing arm mechanism
(1+2)
between
which the disk platter spins.
As a closing note on this subject I cannot see how the heads can enter the disk platter area without initially touching the platter surface, it may well be that they "fly" as do normal harddisk heads a short time after entry (on a working sparq you will have noticed that the drive starts off by spinning slowly and then steps up to a higher speed for full operation). A normal Harddisk does a similar thing when it starts up and closes down, it simply moves the heads to a special unused track and as the disk platter slows down the drive has a "controlled crash" in the parking zone. Spin up is a gradual process (although quick on a modern drive) where the drive gradually spins up until there is sufficient air flow over the head surface to allow the head to float or fly above the platter. |
 |
| Violins Update:
David Shott tells me that, after speaking with a member of the original Syquest design team, the Violin sound "actually comes from a harmonic created by rushing air, the proximity of the head to the surface , the length of the wiper flex mechanism and just a fraction of a degree of misalignment caused by severe mechanical shock to the Assembly. If you can imagine a tuning fork fed by an airborne turbulence then you've got the general idea." Dave also tells me that the engineer informed him that the alignment procedures used in the factory to set up the head alignment were "actually done with a precision comparator and driven lever. You'll notice an upper tab and lower ring approx. 180 deg. from the unparked wiper. The heads were positioned with a calibration signal over a track on a reference disk then the support assembly was locked down." - Cheers Dave, this info is very much appreciated. So it looks as if in the factory a reference disk was used, probably not dissimilar to those disks used to align floppy drive heads (the only previous form of head alignment I have actually performed). In floppy drive alignment, the reference disk has a concentric track written onto it, the heads are then indexed over this track with the head stepper motor and the output of both heads adjusted using an oscilloscope to equalise the outputs of both heads (the "cats eyes" adjustment). I can only assume that the Sparq alignment follows a similar procedure. |
| Before I adjusted my own Sparq I did consider the implications
of mis-aligning the head, my reasoning was this:
Upon inspection it was apparent that the Sparq drive uses a voice coil to move the heads over the disk surface, in a floppy drive a stepper motor is used - This is a key factor, as a stepper motor can ONLY move in small, set increments. Therefore during floppy drive head alignment the main danger is misaligning the head partially between tracks. This is not the case with the Sparq`s voice coil arrangement, as a voice coil is infinately variable and is capable of driving the heads to ANY position on the disk surface. This is therefore not a concern when aligning a Sparq drive mechanism. In the case of a floppy drive the drive controller needs
to start with the heads over a known position on the disk surface, this
is achieved by an optical TRACK ZERO SENSOR. In floppy drives the
controller starts from this known position, then increments the head across
the disk surface, counting the tracks as it goes. As the Sparq has no track
Zero sensor the positional information for the heads must be gained from
the data recorded on the disk (or from it`s format anyway). It is
therefore reasonable to assume that as soon as the Sparq`s controller chip
starts to get intelligable information back from the heads, it will know
its position on the disk and can then index the heads to whatever position
it likes. Therefore without specialist equipment or setup jigs, our primary
concern must be to eliminate the violin noise (and hence correct the position
of the heads vertically above the platter) using whatever adjustment is
available and thus allow the controller to see valid positional information
data. Hence the bearing screw tweak. This IS
kitchen table technology, no guarantees given or implied, but as I said,
it has worked for me |
 |
Why
not try posting a message on my new Syquest forum ? -
just click on the button...
(It`s a bit new yet, very few postings, so please post if you wish to support the idea and keep it running) |
| alt.syquest | - Newsgroup with other Sparq users |
| members3.boardhost.com/syquestsupport/ | - Message board for Syquest users, annoying popups :-( but very good content |
| www.syquest.org | - Unofficial syquest support page, contains links to various useful Syquest sites. |
| www.syquestrepair.com | - IMI, a US based Commercial repair centre |
| http://members.localnet.com/~mmraz/linux-syquest-FAQ.html | - Linux Sparq installation webpage. Linux ONLY |
| www.syquest.de/d/jumper/sparq/index.html | - German site (In german), Jumper settings for Internal Sparq. |
| www.driverzone.com/drivers/syquest/syquest.html | - Drivers & Manuals for Sparq |
| www.download-safari.net/AllFiles/SyQuestSparQDriver%28parallelport%29-85.html | - Drivers for Sparq drives |
| www.syquest-service.net | - US company supporting Sparq drives (& maybe warrenty issues?) |
| www.pcs-sj.com | - US Company that was contracted by Iomega to distribute their remaining stocks of Sparq drives and cartridges, they offer repair services as well. |
| www.frs-europe.nl/default.htm | - European branch of PCS |
| www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Station/1446/ | - Firmware upgrades for internal drives plus drivers and other useful internet links etc. |
| www.frii.com/~dwangoac/syquest.html | - Lots of good advice if you are experiencing problems with internal or external Sparqs, especially good advice relating to software configuration problems, unrecognised drives, internal IDE drive problems etc. |
| www.scmmicro.com/downloads.html?PID=36&s1=8&s2=61 | - Provides latest Epath ATA parallel port drivers for Windows 2000 and 95/98 |
| www.drivesavers.com | - SYQT recommended data recovery service in the US. As SYQT no longer have great resources at their command, they can no longer offer a data recovery service themselves for customers with faulty drives or cartridges, but they have arranged preferrential rates with "DRIVESAVERS", they can be contacted directly by telephone on 1-800-440-1904, 1-415-382-2000 or 1-415-883-4232. |
| www.syqt.com | - SYQT, formerly known as Syquest Technologies. Their site is up and running again, drives are still on sale and new software drivers are included on their site. |
Sparq`s for sale !
- Yes you can still get them (it may even be less painful than repairing
yours):
| www.syqt.com | - Formerly Syquest Technologies themselves. Drives on sale for $249.99 with FULL warrenties. |
| www.softwareandstuff.com/index.html | - 
But they still have 3 pack cartridges for $20 ! Better hurry ... |
| store.yahoo.com/7-24outlet/sparq.html | - Company that aims to continue to provide new cartridges and drives, they are cheap and are backed by Yahoo, so they should be pretty good... |
| www.7-24outlet.com/7-24outlet/syqspar1gbin.html | - |
| www.durabyte.com | - 5 pack of sparq disks for $100 |
| http://www.pcperipherals.com/description.php?II=2&UID=2001072907555662.253.64.5 | - |
| http://www.liquidations.com/syquest_cartridge.htm | Report stocks of Sparq Cartridges at $5.50 each, minimum of 5 at a time. Please let me know if you buy anything from this site as they may be wholesale only. |
| Update
from SYQT themselves (Formerly known as Syquest Technology):
I received today (27/05/00) an E-mail from Pat Allen, Acting Director for SYQT Technical support. He has asked me to point the following out to Syquest Sparq users who may be buying a drive from one of the auction houses currently selling them. (edited extract from Pat's e-mail): Caveat emptor! (Let the buyer beware) There is no factory warranty on items purchased at auction. Here is
the situation- As you know SyQuest entered into Chapter
So there you have it, straight from the horses mouth as it were, if you want a 12 month warranty with SYQT themselves you have got to buy the drive directly from their Web-site, they will not support the device if it is purchased elsewhere. Which is fair enough really. A key factor will of course be how many "Auction House" drives you can buy for the equivalent SYQT price... On the other side of the coin, if they (the auction house) have not bought a warranty from SYQT on these devices, you had better make sure you have a fire proof returns option if the drives are found to be faulty, or just consider the drives to be throw away items if a fault occurs and the fixes mentioned on this page don`t work for you. Personally I`d have no real qualms about buying from an auction house, unfortunately they won`t ship to the UK... damn. If anyone has any experiences of purchasing drives from these places I`d be interested to hear how things went. |
| About
me:
I am 34 years old,
a satcoms engineer in the UK with HNC and other electronics qualifications,
I have also trained and worked in computer field service and currently
work planning and building commercial satcoms systems.
|
| Thanks:
My thanks go to those
people who have donated to me their Sparq drives (after transferring their
data) as this has enabled me to gain a better understanding of these devices.
Thanks go to all people who have contributed to this page. Thanks
also to:
|
| Anything
to add or any feedback ?
As I have limited Webspace I really do appreciate any feedback regarding the usefulness or otherwise of the information held here, if it is of no real use to anyone I can better use the space for something that is. I would be particularly interested hear from you if any of this site has helped you to get your drive going again, but I appreciate any feedback whatsoever. Please checkout my guestbook link below. Do you know any additional links, or have any information that may help others ? If so let me know and I will try and include them here. My thanks to all those who have given me feedback and information to date.
|
| You can either E-mail me at sparq_uk@yahoo.comor click on this link to view and sign my Guestbook |  Courtesy
of: |
| I have tried to detail most of my experiences and knowledge of the Sparq drive here, if you have a specific problem with the drive, that has not been addressed on this page, you may like to post a question in the alt.syquest newsgroup, as there are lots of people out there, with differing experiences of the Sparq, who may be able to help you further. |
| Best
of luck with your Sparq repair.
Andy. |
 |
I would recommend backing up your data
to a more reliable storage medium as soon as you can after getting your
Sparq working again, however that said, my own drive is still functioning
fine over 12 months after performing the fix...