Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!ntvaxb!ac08 From: ac08@vaxb.acs.unt.edu Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac Subject: Re: it's the little things that annoy me (disks) Message-ID: <23448.261e6cc4@vaxb.acs.unt.edu> Date: 7 Apr 90 22:42:12 GMT References: <52048@coherent.coherent.com> <90097.131238CXT105@psuvm.psu.edu> Lines: 34 In article <90097.131238CXT105@psuvm.psu.edu>, CXT105@psuvm.psu.edu (Christopher Tate) writes: > > While I've never seen the particular behavior you describe here, I am > generally unimpressed by the behaviour of the FDHD drives. One day, I tried > to format a stack of HD disks in an SE that had these drives. Out of five > disks, I eventually got *one* of them to format, I think on the fourth try. > S'funny. I have good luck with them. Unless I use cheap disks- then things suddenly stop working... > There seems to be a historical difficulty with Macintosh disk drives -- they > generally have a hard time formatting disks. The student microcomputer lab > attendants here at Penn State have come up with a standard practice for > dealing with disks that fail to initialize (in old-style drives): format > them in an IBM PS/2 first, then try again. It works pretty well.... > In the place where I work, we have to format MS-DOS 720K 3.5" disks on a Mac SE under Apple File Exchange- the MS-DOS drives just can't seem to do a good format... > Am I deluded, or do the Macs have weaker magnetic fields when they write > to their disks than other computers? It would certainly seem that way.... > It might just be the disks... I usually take the disk out of the drive and turn the hub by hand. That can make them work (sometimes). Alignment probs? Chad Irby ac08@untvax vaxa.acs.unt.edu