Floppies work on some machines and not others

[Leenie]

Has anyone else ever noticed this? Frequently a patron will try and access their floppy disc on one of our pcs and they get the message saying that it needs to be formatted, but if they move to a different pc they can access their files just fine. Today I tried one of my own floppies that I created 2 documents on and it would not work on 3 different pcs, but I could open it on 2 others and my own obviously. Any explanation for why this happens? Thanks.

Colleen Gayle Lane
Milton Public Library

 

[roland63]

Sometimes it is the floppy itself - try reinserting see if that works.

We have same thing happen every now and then, Want to know what always opens those "Disk not formatted, do you want to format?" disks?

Windows 98 - I lie to you not....

 

[silentii]

what he said. and then some... but i moved away from floppies as soon as the pc's coming out became unreliable with it, move to a thumb drive??

 

[Leenie]

We do offer that ability, but not all patrons come in with thumb drives. Many still bring in floppies. As long as I can tell them that saving to floppies is unreliable and a known issue I can advise that it is "save at own risk".

Colleen Gayle Lane
Milton Public Library

 

[Freestone]

If the floppy drives in your systems are old and well used, they probably have developed head alignment issues. There is no real cure for this other than replacement.

 

[BadBigBen]

The reason why the floppies do not read in some drives is simple:

the heads run on two rails (usually), and these are pinned down with two clips (at each end)... now as drives get older these rails tend to move, and some just get worn down a bit, becoming unaligned...

even though FDDs are cheap ($5 or so), they are ancient tech, and as mentioned a USB-stick is a cheap and viable solution...

Ben

"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."

 

[Stella740pl]

There is no real cure for this other than replacement.

As far as I can recall, they did fix them back in the 80s. Nowadays, it is probably cheaper to replace them.

If same drives don't read the floppies time after time, they should be replaced. But it often happens that they do work on some floppies and not others, and other drives work on different ones. As I seem to remember from long ago, the floppies usually can be read on drives aligned similarly to the one they were formatted/written on.

But of course, unless some of the drives absolutely need replacement, you can always advise customers to save at their own risk, and suggest to try reading their files on other PCs you have there. The option to save to a floppy should be available in a public library.

 

[Freestone]

At least for me, I am remembering the days when there were 720KB and 1.44MB floppies. Alignment of drives back then was much more hit and miss. Floppies formatted on a system usually always read on that system, but not necessarily on others. Then there were the different widths (density?) of 720KB formatted tracks versus 1.44MB which added to the problem. This was even worse when a 1.44MB formatted floppy was used then reformatted to 720KB (or maybe the other way around?).

The other question that isn't answered, and perhaps can't be, is the AGE of the diskettes the public are bringing in. At my job I have run into people who have used the same diskette for YEARS, no kidding. And despite all the teaching, warnings and gigabytes of available backup storage, I bet they still do. The lead the horse to water saying comes to mind.

At any rate, diskette drives are relatively cheap. If you have any budgeted money for repair items, try to replace a few and see if that lowers the failures.

 

[jurgen36]

Its most likely not the floppies. I discussed that problem a few years ago. The newer floppy drives record on a much narrower magnetic stripe. I you find a floppy drive manufactured before about the year 2000 you will be ok. We tested over 500 new floppy drives and found all of them to be out of specifications.
Regards

Jurgen

 

[edfair]

When there were discrete parts available and the bad ones could be diagnosed as bad, yes, they were fixed. Particularly when a 35t, ss, sd sold for around $400.00. But you also needed a scope and an alignment disk and you got to look at a lissajou (sp?) figure while the drive sat there doing seek & delay to track 17.
1)One of the problems is the loss of magnetic flux on the drive. If it wasn't laid down with a full signal it tends to go away and you lose the ability to find a sector.
2)There is the tracking issue, since they are no longer adjustable.
3)Speed difference between drives can affect it.
4)The heads generally track using a worm gear. Wear on it or the follower will allow tracking to cange marginally.
5)Wrong density floppy will affect it. One density drive will not hold magnetism generated by the heads of the other density.

These are some of the issues. I generally try to search out the best of the lot to use and scrap the rest.

 

[Stella740pl]

At least for me, I am remembering the days when there were 720KB and 1.44MB floppies.

Back in mid 80s, we were using 360KB and 720KB 5[small]1/4[/small]" floppies and using some keys with the DOS format command to format those intended for 720KB to allow 800KB. Later we got 1.44MB 3[small]1/2[/small]", and it felt great!

I've seen those huge 8" floppies, too, but at first thought it was some kind of a joke, and not a real thing, because I've never seen the drive. We were hanging them on the wall for decorations.

 

[Leenie]

Thank you everyone for all the very useful information.

Colleen Gayle Lane
Milton Public Library

 

[edfair]

Stella,
I was talking about late 70s and 140kb drives at 35 tracks. Later they got to 40 tracks. The 360s came later when the 2nd head became available. Then somebody got the idea to change the speed depending on what track you were on and things got even more complicated.
All of this on the 5" frame. Then they figured out a way to combine the worm/carriage of the 8" and the smaller heads and got us to the 3" and 720. Then to HD and 1.4.

You can google "fdformat" and get information on pumping them up to 2.0mb by changing the interleaves and writing closer to the hub. Some allow 82 tracks.

 

[ceh4702]

Floppy drives can be useless if you never use them. They just fill up with dust. Most software will not fit on a floppy, so I have deemed them worthless. I would not even build a computer with a floppy drive. I still have a couple of them sitting around but I dont ever use them.

Flash drives just work better.

If you do not like my post feel free to point out your opinion or my errors.

 

[edfair]

Everybody to their own thing. I wouldn't build a machine without one. Better to have one and not need it than to need it and not have it.

I've hit two occasions in the last week where I got burned by the lack of one. Not on a machine I support, but one somebody else supports, and the customers paid for about 10 floppy drives in labor charges in getting the networks set up to transfer 30k of files.

 

[LawnBoy]

I used to have a decent sideline re-aligning floppy drives for $25 a throw, it only took ~ 10 min.

I quit doing it when surface-mount technology made it too difficult to find a good spot to hook up the o'scope.

I always have at least one spare floppy drive on hand at all times, at work and home. Try loading NT on a RAID without one... (yes there are people still using NT server)

"We must fall back upon the old axiom that when all other contingencies fail, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth." - Sherlock Holmes

 

[Stella740pl]

ceh4702,

Did you notice that the OP works in public library?

If the customers coming in the library to do research and to save a file or two on a floppy, then:
a) the library has to accomodate them;
b) most likely, those one or two files will fit on the floppy - it's not software, it is some plain text with an occassional image;
c) the people coming to do research in the library most likely don't have a computer with internet access or a computer at all in their home, so they either don't know what a flash drive is, don't know how to use one, don't need it most of the time and don't want to spend on it.

 

[wahnula]

I wouldn't build a machine without one. Better to have one and not need it than to need it and not have it.

My thoughts exactly, Ed. For the $6 it costs plus the convenience in loading SATA or SCSI XP drivers I have yet to abandon them either.


To Leenie:

I certainly hope the IT department at your institution has "hardened" those PCs which allows folks to import their data. We have a policy here at my little office network that no outside floppies, flash drives, CDs or DVDs are allowed to be used on office PCs without my permission. This prevents people bringing in Spyware, Adware or Viruses from their home PCs into my network. Yes, I have A/V on every PC, but I'd rather not have to deal with it.

With the bargain-basement price of flash drives, maybe you could have one behind your desk that you can use to ping-pong data from outside media to the library's PCs, under your watchful eye.

Tony

"Buy what you like, or you'll be forced to like what you buy"...me

 

[acewarlock]

The quaility of Floppy drives today is lacking as they are made so cheaply, that where most of the problem lies.




This is a Signature and not part of the answer, it appears on every reply.

This is an Analogy so don't take it personally as some have.

Why change the engine if all you need is to change the spark plugs.

 

[Leenie]

Thank- you, Stella! Everything you say is completely true. What we've decided to do is stop selling floppies, remove our external floppy drives which were a problem more often than not. That leaves us with a few pcs that do have floppy drives that they can use at their own risk.

And, thank- you Tony. All our public pcs have something called Valt-X on them. Basically you can do whatever you want to a pc and as soon as it reboots it goes back to the latest clean backup we have of it. On top of that we also have 2 other security softwares that lock down most of their options so that we only let them access what softwares, etc. we want and even further what menu options in each software.

Colleen Gayle Lane
Milton Public Library