floppy trouble!!

UK1nation · Post by **UK1nation** » Mon Oct 25, 2004 4:30 pm

why cant my mate open his ' A: drive'? when i gave him a diskette he tried to open it and it wanted to format it instead!?? why is this? he have a virus/spyware?
(already had people laugh and say i should buy a USB pen) so no need to laugh people...

thanks 4 all your help!

smb · Post by **smb** » Mon Oct 25, 2004 4:41 pm

It might be an old disk, or the floppy drive could be dirty or old or with misaligned heads.

Post by **FlyingPenguin** » Mon Oct 25, 2004 5:24 pm

You get that message if the computer can't read the floppy. Could be the heads are dirty (common problem) sometimes just popping it back out and putting it in works.

Floppy drives aren't used much so a LOT of dust builds up in there. You can buy a floppy drive cleaner at office Depot.

UK1nation · Post by **UK1nation** » Mon Oct 25, 2004 5:25 pm

no the messahe says: "disc in drive A:/ is not formatted..format now?" but works in mine!

DocSilly · Post by **DocSilly** » Mon Oct 25, 2004 6:27 pm

The floppies read/write heads could've become mis-adjusted after some time ... I have one of those, it can only read floppies it formatted itself. You should try a floppy from your friend that he formatted in his machine, chances are high that your drive might refuse to read it and that would point to misadjusted heads.

wvjohn · Post by **wvjohn** » Mon Oct 25, 2004 8:41 pm

make sure that the formatting of the floppy is compatible as well - 16 bit machines (win 95 win98 ver 1) don't read 32 bit files as i recall