Lesson 15: Installing a Floppy Disk Drive

Step 1: Remove any inserts from front panel

On the front of almost all cases, you will find some type of insert on the front of a drive bay.

If you push in on the insert from the outside, it may come off inside your case and you can just reach in and grab it. Sometimes it pops out from the inside, other times it requires you to remove the front panel first and sometimes they are even screwed in.

However it's set up, remove the insert where you want to install your floppy drive.

There may also be a metal plate inside that needs to be removed as well.

case front panel insert

front panel insert

Since all cases are different, if you need to remove the front panel please consult your case owners manual on how to do this.

Most front panels can be removed by using a flat head screwdriver and prying it off. Before you do this though, make sure you don't have any locking tabs or screws on the inside you have to deal with or you may risk breaking it.

front panel removal

Once the insert is removed, put the front panel back on the case.

Step 2: Install floppy drive into a drive bay

Now that the insert is removed, slide the drive into the bay.

Some cases require you to screw in the drive to secure it into the bay and others have a "no tools required" type setup. Go ahead and secure the drive however it is set up in your case.

Step 3: Connect Floppy cable to motherboard

On your motherboard is a connector labeled "FDD".

fdd motherboard

Locate this and line up your FDD cable. There should be an outward notch on the cable and it should line up similar to the image below.

Once it is lined up, firmly press down and it should slide into place. Like with all cables, do not force it. If it does not go in the first time, you might have it backwards. If your cable does not have an outward notch, the red line on the cable indicates pin #1 so you can line that up with pin #1 on your connector.

Step 4: Connect cable to floppy drive

Connect the other end of the cable we just plugged into the motherboard, into the back of the floppy drive. Similar to the motherboard, the cable should only go in one way but if it does not have the notch, line pin #1 up with the red line on the cable. Pin #1 is almost always located closest to the power connector.

Step 5: Give it power

Connected to your power supply are several power connectors. Connect one of these to the back of the floppy drive. It can only go one one way.

FDD Power

Next Lesson: Hooking up case fans

Now that we've installed our floppy drive, it's time to go to Lesson 16: Installing Case Fans.

If you do not have any case fans, you can skip to hooking up the front panel.

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