Introduction
There is already a wealth of information on drive calibration for the Famicom Disk System. However, it appears that it's not the whole story. Over the last few weeks I've been deeply investigating Famicom Disk Drive calibration.This all started when I purchased six drives from Yahoo Auctions Japan. I'm not really that interested in playing old Famicom games but the technology used in the disk drive is so novel that I just couldn't resist. What makes it so novel?
History of Famicom Disk System
Let's start with the disk. Standard 3 1/2" floppy disk? Nope! this little fella is 2.8". It wasn't an unintentional decision but to understand that we'll first need to take a short detour.Quality & Piracy
Imagine it's the 1980s and home video gaming is still an emerging market. Specifically, the market for games is full of options and many companies are churning them out to capture a slice of this exciting new pie.
Adding to this, piracy was increasingly common and Nintendo was no slouch in their response. For example, the delightful "Nintendo" loading screen on your DMG Gameboy was required by the bootloader to be included in the cartridge and play games. This was intended to enforce copyright litigation against any who dared bootleg Nintendo's content.
So — when Nintendo decided to use Mitsumi's new Quickdisk format in their game console it wasn't a mistake. They didn't want people to use readily accessible 3 1/2" floppy drives to make bootlegs.It's probably not a question you're considering but this next point is a very important contributor to Nintendo's decision to use a rewritable disk format instead of cartridges. Cost. At that time, diskettes were peanuts compared to custom manufactured mask ROM chips and the benefits didn't stop at there.
Customers could take their disks to a Disk Writer Kiosk and buy an entirely new game for relatively cheap (~500¥ at the time or ~$4.50 USD in 2022). Even more, the games could use save states! This was new technology. Hot stuff. Not normally accessible to game consoles, as EEPROM was very expensive in the 80's. I don't have information on exactly how readily accessible the Disk Writer Kiosks were but I'm inclined to believe they were very easy to find. Nintendo rented the Kiosks to all variety of retail space to make them accessible.
I'm always on the look out for more FDS accessories, including disks and drives. If you have some which you would like to donate please feel free to reach out.
These days the FDS is considered pretty challenging. It's not that the games were bad or really of any different quality than what we normally expect from Nintendo. In fact, Zelda was first released in Japan on the FDS. You can find disks beginning at 330¥ at Hard Offs in Japan and the prices only go up when you look on Yahoo Auctions Japan.
Where's The Problem?
The disk drives themselves are fickle beasts. The disks are meant to spin in the drives but because the design uses belts, the original rubber has flaked and melted into black goo. While finding replacement belts is trivial and the actual process of replacing the belt is reasonable simple, there is an absence of complete guidance.You will find dozens of guides on this process and they will, with varying measurements of clarity, have the same theme. Disassemble the drive. Take the gear-train off, replace the belt, and do _something_ with the spindle. If you're not familiar with the Famicom Disk System and these terms don't mean anything to you don't worry — I provide clarification in the guide section.
There are often steps required to complete calibration which these article simply do not cover. Of these, the worst offenders seem to become more ambiguous the closer they are to their conclusion!
