🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <52048@coherent.coherent.com> dplatt@coherent.com (Dave Platt) writes:
>In article <Apr.1.20.23.56.1990.19753@topaz.rutgers.edu> wilmott@topaz.rutgers.edu (Ray Wilmott) writes:
>
>> 1) Why does the Macs handling of floppies seem to be *so* much
>> fussier than other computers? On the other micros I've used
>> (IBM, Atari ST, Atari 8-bit), you *rarely* if ever attempt to
>> use a floppy you made a year ago and find the disk "unreadable".
>> You instead find a particular *file* unreadable every once in a blue
>> moon. On the Mac I've *never* found a file on a floppy to be
>> corrupted; instead I've found *many* times (on seperate Macs) whole
>> *disks* that have become unreadable. This whole thing seems
>> fishy to me. What does the stupid Mac do...scan every sector to see
>> if it's readable, and if one isn't, it *assumes* the *whole* disk
>> is bad?!?!?!?!?
>
>1) Improper formatting of floppies.  Some people are in the habit of
>   buying single-sided floppies (knowing that the "cookies" are coated
>   on both sides), trying to format them double-sided, and (when the
>   format operation succeeds) assuming that the diskettes are safe to
>   use.
>   This is a dangerous practice... many single-sided floppies are ones
>   which passed the manufacturer's certification process on one side,
>   but failed on the other side.  Such floppies may work OK for a
>   while... but if there are defects in the oxide layer on the second
>   side, data written to this side of the floppy may "fade" after a
>   while.

While in theory I agree with this, in practice, I've never had any problems.
I have over 200 single sided floppies at home, most of which I bought years
ago for my original 128k doorstop.  When I upgraded the 128k to a 512ke some
years ago, I reformatted these floppies as 800k.  None went bad.  A large
percentage of these floppies were then used in school computers, in both
single and double sided drives, where they worked just fine.  In fact they
still work just fine in my SE.  I've never had any "fading" problems.

>4) Improper storage of the diskettes.  If you store a diskette near any
>   device which generates a magnetic field, information on the disk can
>   be partially erased... leading to an unreadable disk at some later
>   time.  Diskettes should not be placed on top of an external-floppy
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>   drive, or leaned up against the side of the Mac (I _think_ that only
>   the left side of the classic Mac is a danger zone, but I could well
>   be wrong).

I always thought that this was a real silly argument.  If the disk isn't
harmed by being *in* the drive, how on God's green earth can it be harmed
by sitting on *top* of the drive?

>5) Contamination of the diskette during storage... by dust, tobacco
>   smoke, etc.  People sometimes fling floppies around as if they were
>   invulnerable, or stick them in a shirt-pocket... and end up with a
>   dirty or scratched "cookie".

After using the Mac in a University envrionment for 5 years, I can state
that short of shooting the blasted things, you *can't* hurt a floppy.
I've seen people do real nasty things to them, including handling them with
grape jelly smeared hands, and they seem to work just fine (although I wouldn't
want *that* floppy in *my* drive).


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