Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!csd4.csd.uwm.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!apctrc!zgel05
From: zgel05@apctrc.trc.amoco.com (George E. Lehmann)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: 3.5" High-Density Woes
Message-ID: <1001@apctrc.UUCP>
Date: 21 Aug 89 19:27:24 GMT
Sender: news@apctrc.UUCP
Reply-To: zgel05@apctrc.trc.amoco.com (George E. Lehmann)
Organization: Amoco Production Company, Tulsa Research Center
Lines: 23

I've enabled my thermal-retard shields, because I know this is probably going
to stir some flames from somewhere, but:

DON'T USE 3.5" DS/DD DISKETTES FOR HD (1.44MB) USAGE!!!!!

In my dealings with a number of customer sites, I have to read backups of
databases sent through the mail on floppy disks.  Invariably, if the disk is
a 5.25 DS/DD formatted at 1.2MB, or a 3.5 DS/DD formatted at 1.44MB, I will
not be able to read the entire disk without one or more sector errors. (The
stupid IBM PS/2 machines will even format a DS/DD disk at 1.44 MB *without*
the extra hole, and all other machines in the world won't read it, cause if
it doesn't have that extra hole, it *can't* be formatted at 1.44, right?!?!?)

The bottom line is, you will probably get away with it for a while, maybe for
a long time.  This seems to be more of a problem between machines, so I would
be especially cautious if these diskettes were being used for backups which
might have to be read on another machine.  In the final analysis, I wouldn't 
put *anything* on one of these "user-enhanced" diskettes that I would even 
slightly miss if the disk went bad.
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                                          To live and not fly is not living...
George Lehmann  PP/ASEL/IA   ...!uunet!apctrc!zgel05 -or- zgel05@trc.amoco.com
Amoco Production Co.      PO BOX 3385, Tulsa, Ok  74102     Voice:918-660-4066