ftw33616@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Frank T. Wang) (11/16/90)
has anyoe used those programs that can format a 1.44 meg disk to, say, 1.7 meg? and other such HIGH formats? how unreliable are these? i figured it'd be as dangerous as formatting a DD disk HD. Frank
gordon@osiris.cso.uiuc.edu (John Gordon) (11/16/90)
I don't think that the disk actually gets formatted to higher density, rather an extra track gets formatted that is usually wasted. I use an extra- track formatter for my Atari ST and it has never given me any problems, and a friend uses a similar program for his IBM-clone, but his is kind of a hassle because you have to run a program to "tell" the BIOS to access the extra track. Aside from that, it works OK, I guess.
mig@cunixd.cc.columbia.edu (Meir I Green) (11/17/90)
I would like to try these super high density formatters. I know that most of the HD disks are *really* rated for *2* megabytes! It seems to be the drive that isn't capable of the format? Can someone send me the whereabouts of these files so I can try them? * * * * * * * ======================= Meir Green | * * * * * * * * ======================= mig@cunixd.cc.columbia.edu | * * * * * * * ======================= N2JPG |
w8sdz@vela.acs.oakland.edu (Keith Petersen) (11/17/90)
mig@cunixd.cc.columbia.edu (Meir I Green) writes: >I would like to try these super high density formatters. >Can someone send me the whereabouts of these files so I can try them? WSMR-SIMTEL20.ARMY.MIL [26.2.0.74] Directory PD1:<MSDOS.DSKUTL> Filename Type Length Date Description ============================================== FDFORM16.ZIP B 76080 901031 Format floppies for greater density/storage This file is also available from Detroit Download Central. Keith -- Keith Petersen Co-SysOp, Detroit Download Central 313-885-3956 (212/V22bis/HST/V32/V42bis) Internet: w8sdz@vela.acs.oakland.edu, w8sdz@eddie.mit.edu, w8sdz@brl.mil Uucp: uunet!umich!vela!w8sdz BITNET: w8sdz@OAKLAND
gordon@osiris.cso.uiuc.edu (John Gordon) (11/18/90)
mig@cunixd.cc.columbia.edu (Meir I Green) writes: >I would like to try these super high density formatters. >I know that most of the HD disks are *really* rated for *2* megabytes! >It seems to be the drive that isn't capable of the format? >Can someone send me the whereabouts of these files so I can try them? If you look closer (at least on some of the disks) it says "2.0 Megabytes *UNFORMATTED* Capacity". Now, I may be stupid, but what the heck good is it to be this way, you can't use it until it's been formatted!! I've always wondered about this....
rb9a@watt.acc.Virginia.EDU (Raul Baragiola) (11/18/90)
In article <1990Nov18.020651.13744@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu> gordon@osiris.cso.uiuc.edu (John Gordon) writes: >mig@cunixd.cc.columbia.edu (Meir I Green) writes: > >>I would like to try these super high density formatters. >>I know that most of the HD disks are *really* rated for *2* megabytes! >>It seems to be the drive that isn't capable of the format? >>Can someone send me the whereabouts of these files so I can try them? > > If you look closer (at least on some of the disks) it says "2.0 >Megabytes *UNFORMATTED* Capacity". Now, I may be stupid, but what the heck >good is it to be this way, you can't use it until it's been formatted!! >I've always wondered about this.... To reasons for this. 1) the formatted capacity depends on the type of format. 2) the marketing guys will always give you the maximum possible number in the specs. Raul A. Baragiola \Internet: raul@virginia.edu Dept. Nuclear Engnr. and Engnr. Physics \Phone: (804)-982-2907 University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA 22901 \ Fax: (804)-924-6270
jaapv@accucx.cc.ruu.nl (Jaap Verhage) (11/19/90)
In article <1990Nov16.035524.22022@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu> ftw33616@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Frank T. Wang) writes: > >has anyoe used those programs that can format a 1.44 meg disk to, say, 1.7 meg? > and other such HIGH formats? how unreliable are these? i figured it'd be >as dangerous as formatting a DD disk HD. > > Frank I've been using FDFORMAT 1.5 for quite some time now, and have had no reliability problems. I'm formatting DSDD disks on a HD drive, 5 1/4", to 820 KB, same on 3 1/2". HD disks get formatted to 1.44 MB and 1.72 MB, respectively. -- Regards, Jaap. Jaap Verhage, Academic Computer Centre, State University at Utrecht, Holland. jaapv@cc.ruu.nl +<-*|*->+ I claim *every*thing and speak for myself
kdq@demott.COM (Kevin D. Quitt) (11/19/90)
In article <1990Nov18.020651.13744@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu> gordon@osiris.cso.uiuc.edu (John Gordon) writes: > If you look closer (at least on some of the disks) it says "2.0 >Megabytes *UNFORMATTED* Capacity". Now, I may be stupid, but what the heck >good is it to be this way, you can't use it until it's been formatted!! >I've always wondered about this.... Well, since there are "tricky" ways of putting more data on the disk than "standard", what number should they list? 1.44MB because that's standard, or 1.8MB because that's what you can get if you're lucky? The point is that by saying 2MB unformatted, you can compare it to other media of a similar type. -- _ Kevin D. Quitt demott!kdq kdq@demott.com DeMott Electronics Co. 14707 Keswick St. Van Nuys, CA 91405-1266 VOICE (818) 988-4975 FAX (818) 997-1190 MODEM (818) 997-4496 PEP last 96.37% of all statistics are made up.
walk@mrcnext.cso.uiuc.edu (Todd Walk) (11/21/90)
ftw33616@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Frank T. Wang) writes: >has anyoe used those programs that can format a 1.44 meg disk to, say, 1.7 meg? > and other such HIGH formats? how unreliable are these? i figured it'd be >as dangerous as formatting a DD disk HD. > Frank All programs for the IBM that do this add 1 extra sector per track (or 2 or 3..)At 1 extra sector per track, a 720K IBM disk (9 sec., 80 tracks) is increased to 800K (about the most 1MB unformated disks can hold while formated). With a 1.44MB disk you can squeeze on 2 or 3 extra sectors per track, giving between 1.6-1.8MB. As for the reliability of adding these extra sectors to the tracks, that depends on the individual diskettes. A value called the coercitivity determines the magnetic strength of the disk and is very important in determining how much information can be put on it. For 1MB 3.5" disks it is about 600, 2MB 3.5" about 700. The amount of coercitivity that a disk actually has is a factor of the manufacturing process and can vary significantly. If it is lower than it is supose to be, the disk will be unreliable with the extra sectors. Plus, old disks tend to lose their coercitivity. As for why you can't get 1MB of storage on a 1MB unformated disk (and 2MB on a 2MB...), disk manufacturers measure the amount of bytes that can be reliably placed on the disk (of course you can get more bytes on the outside tracks than on the inside tracks). Therefore, with a constant speed disk drive (such as the ones on IBMs), you get much less than the unformated density. Todd Walk walk@mrcnext.cso.uiuc.edu