Toshiba’s first IDE interface hard drive line began with these, the MK-232F/MK-233F/MK-234F series. As per my previous post on the Toshiba MK-234FC models, these seem to have a fairly consistent issue with surface adhesion (if looking at the 2 of 3 drives I have from this series). Fortunately, this MK-232FC works perfectly, so it can be heard in its rather underwhelming operational condition.
While my last post on these went into depth concerning the internals of these drives, this post will go into more depth concerning their history and place in the market in 1989.
Drive Attributes ------------------------------------- Toshiba MK-232FC ------------------------------------- Capacity 43MB Mfc Date 1989/1990 Format 3.5" Interface PATA Platters 2 Heads 3 RPM 3600 CHS 845/3/35 (native) -------------------------------------
Holding only half of the platters of the MK-234FC’s, the MK-232FC is less than half the capacity of the former. Fortunately, there’s less to go wrong in this case, which is perhaps why this drive is in such good shape still. Released in 1989, this series of drives was Toshiba’s first entry into the IDE interface market. They were available in three capacities; the MK-232FC at 43MB, the MK-233FB at 76MB and finally, the MK-234FC at 101MB. The MK-233FB was only available in a SCSI format, thus the suffix of B being present. All capacities were available in SCSI formats, with their interface counterparts being the MK-232FB and MK-234FB.
This line of drives was the direct successor to the Toshiba MK-132FA, MK-133FA and MK-134FA line (in 18MB, 30MB and 45MB capacities respectively). These drives were only available in MFM formats, as opposed to these drives which were only available in IDE or SCSI. Mechanically, aside from an increase in surface density and corresponding reading techniques, both of these series are identical.
Toshiba had two formats of labelling, this being the later version of the two. Both versions can be seen on my previous post on the MK-234FC drives. This format was later recycled for some of Toshiba’s earlier 2.5″ drives, with some minor language and format corrections. The very bold “CAUTION!!” tag remained for quite some time.
As with all Toshiba hard drives from this period, the MK-232FC was only produced in Toshiba’s factory in Tokyo, Japan.
Being a full-height 3.5″ drive, these are pretty heavy at approximately 800 grams. The MK-234FC’s come in close to a kilogram.
Aside from the silkscreen, and firmware changes of course, the PCB layout on these drives is identical across the board.
--------------------------
PJ10 Header Definition
--------------------------
+---+
1 |o o|2 LED
3 |o o|4 SLV_PRS
5 |o o|6 MST/SLV
7 |o o|8 DRV_PRS
9 |o o|10 TEST1
11|o o|12 TEST2
+---+
--------------------------
You’ll notice if you look at the PJ10 header, to the right of the IDE connector, there’s no jumpers currently installed. The drive currently acts as a slave, so it’ll need some jumpers when it ends up being used in a machine full-time. For a more in-depth insight into the PCB’s on these drive, I recommend my last post on the MK-234FC’s.
The PCB dictates this drive was manufactured in earl-mid 1990, although given the lack of date codes it’s hard to tell the exact point of production.
Much like most drives from this perioid, the capacitors haven’t held up well. These have failed identically to the capacitors on the MK-1034FC I covered, bubbling up and spewing a white-ish electrolyte all over the PCB. They will have to be replaced, likewise with the MK-1034FC, with identical modern-day equivalents. Seemingly, Toshiba’s designs only used 25V 33uF capacitors during this period.
(Update 2022-11-25: This drive has since been recapped! Due to the fact that these drives use a solenoid to unlock the actuator arm, if capacitors drift too far out of their designated specifications, then a sufficient magnetic field cannot build up properly in the solenoid inductor. This drive reached a point where it refused to unlock the head-stack, but after a recap, this issue has been resolved. The motor driver IC unfortunately also suffered from this situation, resulting in it needing to be replaced (the spindle-motor would only reach ~75% speed, where the controller would then also refuse to unlock the head-stack, for obvious reasons). However, this drive is back to 100% health. If you ever find one of these, I’d recommend recapping it as soon as possible.)
Ah, Toshiba. The masters of placing the Molex connector in the most inconvenient spot ever. However, it makes perfect sense when considering the overall PCB layout. I’m sure at the time of this drive being manufactured, connector stress was a large concern of horizontally mounted Molex connectors. It’s fortunate that Toshiba placed it on the underside, with the succeeding MK-1034FC series.
Toshiba used a relatively standard track layout for these, as opposed to the MK-1034FC’s which are laid out sequentially.
This drive reports no bad sectors via Spinrite v6.0. It’s in perfect health and I sure hope it stays that way! I plan on actively using this drive in an IBM Model 30 (8086 type), since my old 20MB IBM WDI-325Q is really on its last legs. This drive seems like the perfect candidate for such a replacement (via an XT-IDE card, of course).
After only being in production for just under 3 years, Toshiba retired this drive design after roughly 4 years of use in a multitude of models (as mentioned above). The MK-1034FC demonstrated Toshiba’s intention to move forward with a modern and simpler design strategy, only to exit the 3.5″ market soon after.
While it can be said this HDA design died with the MK-234FC as its flagship, it still performs to some degree over 30 years later. The issues Toshiba clearly had with long-term surface adhesion, alongside the scarcity these models bring in the early 2020’s dictates how few of these drives are likely to remain in another decades time.
And with that, all of Toshiba’s 3.5″ PATA models have been covered, ignoring the even rarer SCSI-type MK-233FB revision.
Once again, if you’d like to check out the other vintage Toshiba 3.5″ drives I’ve covered, feel free to check out the following posts (in order of drive release year):
Toshiba MK-1034FC 106MB (1992)
If you missed the video I made on this drive, you can find it here: