U
Umma Gumma
Is it possible to format and use an older 720K floppy in XP?
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M
M.I.5¾
Umma Gumma said:Is it possible to format and use an older 720K floppy in XP?
I was about to say, 'yes', but then I thought, "Why is he asking this
question". So I checked and indeed 720k is not offered as an option on the
floppy disk format screen. I can only suggest having a look at:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/140060/en-us
I should add that I didn't have a 720k floppy to hand when I looked at this.
H
Helge Haensel
Hi, try Start/Run, type cmd.exe, OKI was about to say, 'yes', but then I thought, "Why is he asking this
question". So I checked and indeed 720k is not offered as an option on
the
floppy disk format screen. I can only suggest having a look at:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/140060/en-us
I should add that I didn't have a 720k floppy to hand when I looked at
this.
Enter: format /?, format /F:720 or .../F1.44
Good luck!
Helge
B
Bob I
Use
format A: /t:80 /n:9
format A: /t:80 /n:9
B
Bob I
M.I.5¾ said:I was about to say, 'yes', but then I thought, "Why is he asking this
question". So I checked and indeed 720k is not offered as an option on the
floppy disk format screen. I can only suggest having a look at:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/140060/en-us
I should add that I didn't have a 720k floppy to hand when I looked at this.
Piece of cake, see my reply to OP. Want to play? Take a 1.44 and tape
over the other hole, the one opposite the write protect tab, and have a
go at it.
U
Umma Gumma
Helge Haensel said:Hi, try Start/Run, type cmd.exe, OK
Enter: format /?, format /F:720 or .../F1.44
Good luck!
Helge
I thought of that. Thanks. However, with a floppy in the drive the drive
hung/hanged. (Was suspended). And to abort I had to reboot for fear of
burning out the drive.
U
Umma Gumma
Bob I said:Piece of cake, see my reply to OP. Want to play? Take a 1.44 and tape over
the other hole, the one opposite the write protect tab, and have a go at
it.
Yeah, and I hear tell you can punch a hole opposite to the write protect tab
and turn a small one into a 1.44.
B
Bob I
Umma said:I thought of that. Thanks. However, with a floppy in the drive the drive
hung/hanged. (Was suspended). And to abort I had to reboot for fear of
burning out the drive.
the /F:720 won't work, not supported.
B
Bob I
I wouldn't bother, the 720k disks are usually junk. But, actually we didUmma said:Yeah, and I hear tell you can punch a hole opposite to the write protect tab
and turn a small one into a 1.44.
something similar back when we had only 5 1/4 SS floppy drives. You
would notch the DS floppy disks so you could flip them over and write to
both sides that way. But you wouldn't want to do it with the SS floppy
disks as only one side was intended to be written to.
K
Ken Blake, MVP
Hi, try Start/Run, type cmd.exe, OK
Enter: format /?, format /F:720 or .../F1.44
Nope. Read here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/302113
U
Umma Gumma
Ken Blake said:Nope. Read here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/302113
Oh well. It was an interesting exercise. I get this error message when I try
this command...
C:\Documents and Settings\Owner>format A: /t:80 /n:9
Insert new disk for drive A:
and press ENTER when ready...
The type of the file system is RAW.
The new file system is FAT.
Formatting 720K
Format cannot run because the volume is in use by another
process. Format may run if this volume is dismounted first.
ALL OPENED HANDLES TO THIS VOLUME WOULD THEN BE INVALID.
Would you like to force a dismount on this volume? (Y/N) y
Cannot lock the drive. The volume is still in use.
It's not really that important. I realized this morning I did a dumb thing.
Hindsight always better than .... etc. I through out what had to be 100
floppies. Never used them. Years old. But I retained some. All low density.
Stupid me.
R
RalfG
Is the file protection tab set to the unlocked position?
Some program diskettes were made without one so were always locked, to
prevent the software from being accidentally erased by the users. IIRC
blocking the hole with electrical tape worked for both mechanical and
optical diskette sensors.
Some program diskettes were made without one so were always locked, to
prevent the software from being accidentally erased by the users. IIRC
blocking the hole with electrical tape worked for both mechanical and
optical diskette sensors.
U
Umma Gumma
Oh yeah. I would have noticed that immediately.
RalfG said:Is the file protection tab set to the unlocked position?
Some program diskettes were made without one so were always locked, to
prevent the software from being accidentally erased by the users. IIRC
blocking the hole with electrical tape worked for both mechanical and
optical diskette sensors.
M
M.I.5¾
Umma Gumma said:Yeah, and I hear tell you can punch a hole opposite to the write protect
tab and turn a small one into a 1.44.
There used to be lots of advice like this floating around about a decade
ago. The advice failed to mention that the magnetic characteristics of the
disc material used for 1.4M floppies was very different to that used for
720k. Basically, the 1.4M material had a higher coercivity, which the drive
expected to find when it read the disc back. Because of the lower
coercivity of the 720k material, the signal read back is weaker than the
drive expects and this can give read errors. It is further not helped
because the write current is much higher and this tends to 'blur' the
written data.
However, having said that, many users carried on without problems. There
was a rumour that later 720k discs from the cheaper (unbranded) end of the
market, in fact, had the magnetic media designed for 1.4M discs, but
although I never substantiated this, there were a lot of 720k discs around
that were unreliable in 720k drives and yet performed well in 1.4M drives.
B
Bob I
Umma said:Oh well. It was an interesting exercise. I get this error message when I try
this command...
C:\Documents and Settings\Owner>format A: /t:80 /n:9
Insert new disk for drive A:
and press ENTER when ready...
The type of the file system is RAW.
The new file system is FAT.
Formatting 720K
Format cannot run because the volume is in use by another
process. Format may run if this volume is dismounted first.
ALL OPENED HANDLES TO THIS VOLUME WOULD THEN BE INVALID.
Would you like to force a dismount on this volume? (Y/N) y
Cannot lock the drive. The volume is still in use.
It's not really that important. I realized this morning I did a dumb thing.
Hindsight always better than .... etc. I through out what had to be 100
floppies. Never used them. Years old. But I retained some. All low density.
Stupid me.
Please try command prompt from CMD.EXE, not COMMAND.COM, and you may
also use
format A: /t:80 /n:9 /x
as the command line.