floppy disk problem

[b11_]

Floppy disks which function just fine one day are becoming unreadable the
next day (a message appears on the screen indicating that the disk is not
formatted). Seeking help on how to get the files from the floppy or what to
do to make the floppies readable again.

 

[Eric]

b11_ wrote:
> Floppy disks which function just fine one day are becoming unreadable the
> next day (a message appears on the screen indicating that the disk is not
> formatted). Seeking help on how to get the files from the floppy or what to
> do to make the floppies readable again.

have you tried the disks in another computer with a known working disk
drive. Been lurking in here and in the old alt newsgroup for awhile
with the occasional response, and have found that it is usually the
drive and not the disks.

Eric
--
To Reply directly delete "removethis" from email address

 

[Stanislaw Flatto]

b11_ wrote:
> Floppy disks which function just fine one day are becoming unreadable the
> next day (a message appears on the screen indicating that the disk is not
> formatted). Seeking help on how to get the files from the floppy or what to
> do to make the floppies readable again.
Not unusual, one of best trials is to take this floppy back to the drive
that initialised it (formatted in DOS lingo). Usually it reads it properly.
Beware of the GUI version of format, had problems with its performance
till I returned to formatting in DOS prompt screen. No problems since.

Have fun.

Stanislaw

 

[Rod]

In my experience, this occurs when attempting to open
a file of a program from Floppy disc.
I am a fan of MSWorks, and <every> time, one attempts
to open a file of Works from floppy, will render the
floppy unreadable, and the file corrupted
One has to transfer the file from floppy
to HDD prior to opening.
HTH


"b11_" <b11@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:5089F7E8-A8C1-49F5-ACBA-648E368E7696@microsoft.com...
> Floppy disks which function just fine one day are becoming unreadable the
> next day (a message appears on the screen indicating that the disk is not
> formatted). Seeking help on how to get the files from the floppy or what
to
> do to make the floppies readable again.

 

[Franc Zabkar]

On Thu, 19 Jul 2007 15:30:05 -0700, b11_
<b11@discussions.microsoft.com> put finger to keyboard and composed:

>Floppy disks which function just fine one day are becoming unreadable the
>next day (a message appears on the screen indicating that the disk is not
>formatted). Seeking help on how to get the files from the floppy or what to
>do to make the floppies readable again.

Switch to an MS-DOS Prompt and type ...

dir a:\

This should produce a listing of the root directory.

You could also try ...

debug
-L 100 0 0 1
-d 100 2ff
-q

This will dump the boot sector of the diskette.

I don't know if this applies to you, but you might like to read this
MS article:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/140060

It explains why some preformatted diskettes work fine with DOS and
Win95, but produce the "not formatted" error in Win98 and above.

Having said the above, I've just used Debug to zero the media
descriptor byte in the boot sector and in the first copy of the FAT.
Neither explorer.exe nor command.com complained, but scandisk did
detect a problem with this byte in the FAT.

- Franc Zabkar
--
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