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ŻŪŪŪŽ FLOPPY DRIVE HEAD CLEANING KIT
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A floppy drive head cleaning kit consists of:
a) Floppy Jacket
b) Cleaning disk - White cloth like inner disk
c) Cleaning Fluid
STEP 1 : Buy a Floppy Disk Cleaning kit of a brand which provides
extra cleaning disks and a refillable cleaning fluid bottle.
Avoid buying kits which have a spray type of bottle.
STEP 2 : After the cleaning fluid provided with the kit is consumed,
instead of buying a new kit, get a bottle of PROPYL ALCOHOL
from any chemical shop. Fill this alcohol in your existing
bottle and use. It is certainly much more cheaper than a new kit.
STEP 3 : When the cleaning disk gets dirty (turns brownish red) take
it out of the jacket. Put some PROPYL ALCOHOL in a shallow tray
and soak the disk in it. Do not bend the disk. After the disk is
clean take it out and dry. Then happily re use it.
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ŻŪŪŪŽ FUNGUS COATED FLOPPIES
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Once upon a time I had a cute lil Floppy,
I filled it with data, Oh, I was so happy,
Then down came the rains an' up came the moisture,
My cute lil floppy turned to a brute lil Floppy,
And to the fungus I lost all my data.
This tip is from my days in Goa where humidity and the resultant fungus
deposits on floppy was a serious problem. After every rains the floppies
would invariably go bad. This became especially painful when you had important
data on the floppy.
Floppy cleaning (for 5-1/4" floppies):
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STEP 1 : Cut open the fungus infected floppy (as described in TIP 6 below).
STEP 2 : Remove the plastic disk from the jacket and soak it in a detergent
solution. Scrub the surface using your fingers gently.
Don't scratch it with your nails.
STEP 3 : Put the wet disk between folds of absorbant paper (newspaper is
a good choice). Gently press the paper to soak the excess water.
STEP 4 : Then take it out and let it dry in open air.
STEP 5 : When dry, put it in a fresh jacket (from any old discarded floppy).
Don't put it in the original jacket unless you only want to use
it once.
STEP 6 : Retrieve all the data from the floppy. You may then throw away the
floppy or re-use it.
NOTE: You can use this method for 3-1/2" floppies too. Though opening and
putting back the smaller floppy is slightly difficult.
To open, use a sharp flat edged tool like a watchmaker screwdriver
or a scalpel. Insert the sharp edge along the sides of the floppy disk
and gently prise open the two halves of the plastic jacket.
You can use the plastic case of a head cleaning floppy (these normally
have stud-like snaps instead of moulded seals and don't have the
protective-retractible shutter) to put the cleaned disk in.
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ŻŪŪŪŽ FORMATTING WOES
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Have you ever faced the nauseating message, after formmating a
perfectingly working floppy (or maybe even a NEW floppy), saying that
so many clusters are bad, which according to you is mathematically and
magnetically impossible, try this simple test-cum-remedy :
STEP 1 : Format the floppy.
STEP 2 : Repeat the above step at least TWO more times.
The offending number of bad clusters would go away or reduce in
number. You can use the following batch file, "formt.bat",
alongwith the response file, "formt.rsp", to do this -
BATCH FILE (FORMT.BAT) :
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---FORMT.BAT-----8<--------------8<-----------
@echo off
rem Floppy Formmatter
rem Formats a floppy three times
rem Usage : FORMT
format %1 /u/f:1.44 < formt.rsp
-----------------8<---------------8<----------
RESPONSE FILE (FORMT.RSP) :
===========================
---FORMT.RSP-----8<--------------8<-----------
y
y
n
-----------------8<---------------8<----------
To Create the response file use the following command :
COPY CON FMTRESP
And then enter the responses as if you were answering a FORMAT
command queries. Follow the above sequence of keystrokes.
means press the Enter Key.
Press CTRL+Z to save the file.
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ŻŪŪŪŽ FLOPPY DRIVES/STORAGE/USE
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Folks nowadays are knowlegeable enough not to keep their floppies near
magnetic sources but there was a time when the situation was slightly
different. For instance there is this story related by a hardware
engineer friend of mine. One of his new clients had been lodging complaints
about his floppies not working quite regularly. Even brand new floppies.
Everytime the engineer used to go, check out the system and would discover
absolutely no problem at all. The floppy drive and the floppies would
function beatifully. But the next day again the customer would call up.
At last it was discovered that the gentleman had been using a curious
paper weight, namely the rear end of an old loudspeaker, to hold down his
papers and floppies onto his metal topped desk.
There are other innocuous objects on an office desk which are equally
disasterous like telephones, paper weights with magnet (those cute ones for
storing pins/clips) and most of all the computer monitor.
A floppy kept on/near a monitor does not lose data immediately but the
data gets slowly degraded. Similarly do not keep a floppy in the floppy
drive when not in use.
Here are a few tips:
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* Use a metal drawer/almirah/cabinet to store floppies with long term data
on them.
* Clean floppy drive heads only when you start having read/write problems.
Regular head cleaning is a myth and might damage the heads. Always buy
a floppy cleaner which has a white cloth like disk and has a cleaning
fluid with it. Never go in for dry type of cleaning floppy.
* Don't use a fungus coated floppy. This will dirty the heads so badly
that it is very difficult to clean them normally.
Treatment of fungus coated floppies will be dealt in a different TIP.
* In the newer computers set "Floppy seek at Boot" on. This can be done
thru the CMOS in most of the machines.
* Don't carry unprotected micro-floppies (3 1/2") in your shirt pocket
specially if you drive a two wheeler. Dust and sand particles get
trapped at the edges of the shutter and when you put this floppy
in a drive these particles act as sandpaper on the floppy and the heads.
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ŻŪŪŪŽ USING tRACK 0 BAD -- 1.44 MB FLOPPIES
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Most of you might have felt a twinge of anger/frustation, when your new
or just barely a few 'formats' old 1.44 floppy, gives up the ghost saying
track 0 bad. Just to reduce your anger a bit try the following:
Cover the hole on the rear-left (holding the floppy label side up)
with a piece of sticking tape or band-aid.
Then reformat the floppy with the following command -
FORMAT B: /U /F:720
Repeat the above command about once or twice and, hey presto, you
pay for 1.44 Mb and land up with 720 Kb (something similar to
VSNL's TCP/IP vis-a-vis Shell account).
Anyway your floppy was not a total waste; 720 Kb is certainly better than
0 Kb !
Incidently the results are not gauranteed the other way round, that is
don't punch a hole in a 720 Kb disk to get 1.44 Mb. The media is not so
reliable
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ŻŪŪŪŽ USING TRACK 0 BAD -- 1.2 MB FLOPPIES
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Cut open the floppy at the rear edge (with the label side up). This edge of
the floppy is away from the edge which is inserted in the floppy drive.
Keep the floppy on a wooden or cardboard surface, hold it firmly and then
cut of a thin slice (4/10th of a mm) of the rear edge with a sharp blade or
scalpel. Or use a scissor to snip of the slice.
Gently withdraw the media without scratching it. Flip it over and insert it
back.
You can seal the cut end with some adhesive tape or you can leave it open.
Then reformat the floppy. Most of the cases this will result in a non-track
0 bad floppy !
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