I am a long-time Commodore 128 owner. My system still runs and I thought it would be fun to share a couple shots of this classic hardware.

The primary storage medium for home computers of the mid-1980s was the 5-1/4 inch floppy disk. The C-64 and C-128 computers were most often paired with the model 1541 (single-sided) and 1571 (double-sided) disk drives.

It was common practice among 1541 owners to punch an extra notch in their disks so both sides could be used (even single-sided disks had magnetic media on the normally unused side). By flipping these over, you could double the capacity of a single disk. The 1571 was a true double-sided drive and the entire capacity of the disk could be accessed without flipping.

These drives were connected to the computer’s serial bus. Each drive had two ports so they could be daisy chained together. A pair of DIP switches on the rear of the 1571 let you choose unique device numbers from 8 to 11. These switches were hard to reach easily (and were internal to the 1541), so owners often added a supplemental switch to the front of the drive. You can see that I’ve made that modification to the top drive in this photo. Below the power LED on the left, there is a black rocker switch just visible under the face of the drive.

A friend of mine fabricated some thick rubber feet to help raise the top drive up a little higher and improve airflow when the drives are stacked like this.