wordproc@ucf-cs.UCF.EDU (Gang of Three) (08/01/89)
Perhaps I'm just lucky or something, but.... I really don't understand all the hoopla over reading 360K and 1.2MB diskettes in a single 1.2MB drive. I have a 286/20MHz machine with a 1.2MB drive and a 1.44MB 3.5" drive. I format, read and write 360K floppies and 1.2MB floppies all the time and read them on 360K XT's and AT's all the time. My neighbor has an old Leading Edge with only a single 360K drive and a 30MB HD, and he and I are constantly swapping disks. We've never had problems in this area. And I read and write 1.2MB disks and put them on other machines on a regular basis. The machine came this way and I have never been aware of anyone having any kind of problem until I've seen this string of messages. Is this really that much of a problem? Should I open the machine up and post the drive make and model and information about the FDC and so forth? -- Marcus wordproc@ucf-cs.ucf.edu
mvolo@ecsvax.UUCP (Michael R. Volow) (08/04/89)
As one of the posters in the discussion we would be interested in what type of drive you have. We have about three anecdotal reports that NEC 1.2M drives can format and write 360k diskettes well, despite the warnings against this. If some makes of 1.2M drives do this better than other makes, it would be useful to know this. M Volow, VA Medical Center, Durham, NC 27705 mvolo@ecsvax.UUCP 919 286 0411
wek@point.UUCP (Bill Kuykendall) (08/11/89)
>I have a 286/20MHz machine with a 1.2MB drive and a 1.44MB 3.5" drive. I >format, read and write 360K floppies and 1.2MB floppies all the time and read >them on 360K XT's and AT's all the time. My neighbor has an old Leading Edge >with only a single 360K drive and a 30MB HD, and he and I are constantly >swapping disks. We've never had problems in this area. And I read and write This has been my experience as well. I have a couple of hundred users sharing about 70 pcs who use 360k floppies to carry their work files from machine to machine. The only drives I can ever recall having a problem with the disks written by 1.2 drives were full height drives on the original IBM PC's. I should mention that we buy pre-formatted diskettes from ALF. I've even used Media Master on a 1.2 meg drive to read and write single sided double density Osborne disks with few problems (My Osborne Exec used the newer half-height drives also).