Path: utzoo!censor!geac!torsqnt!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!wuarchive!uunet!mcsun!ukc!edcastle!hwcs!neil
From: neil@cs.hw.ac.uk (Neil Forsyth)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: Extened Format Programs...
Message-ID: <5222@brahma.cs.hw.ac.uk>
Date: 19 Dec 90 08:45:35 GMT
References: <36743@cup.portal.com> <1990Dec17.120630.9491@vaxa.strath.ac.uk>
Reply-To: neil@cs.hw.ac.uk (Neil Forsyth)
Organization: Computer Science, Heriot-Watt U., Scotland
Lines: 34

In article <1990Dec17.120630.9491@vaxa.strath.ac.uk> cadp15@vaxa.strath.ac.uk
writes:
>Well, at the moment I have about half a dozen disks that I use daily that are
>double sided, 84 tracks and 11 sector - gives me about 930 Kb.  I've been
>using them for about 8 months now with no problem - BUT I do use high quality
>BRANDED
>disks (mainly TDK and Sony), lesser quality disks just do not cope.  Anything
>past 10 sectors is risky, and to find out how many tracks your drive can cope
>with you can (though not really recommended) tell it to format 85 tracks and
>listen to the drive - when it stops going clunk after every track then you've
>gone to far (ie you can format to one track less than the one you're on).
>
>MOST drives will happily cope with 82 track/10 sectors...

Whether or not you can use 11 SPT is not up to the quality of the disk but the
speed of the drive doing the writing. The slower a drive is, the more chance
you have of using 11 SPT. A faster drive will screw up the data though.
Using beyond 80 tracks is dangerous. I know from bitter experience because
using 82 tracks trashed my drive years ago and I had to replace it.
If you use beyond 80 tracks and it works with your drive, fine BUT I don't
think it would be fair to give your disk to someone else and trash their drive.
The use of disks formatted this way is forbidden in our ST lab for just such
a reason.

The maximum sensible format is 80T, 10SPT, 3SPF.

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! Neil Forsyth                      JANET:  neil@uk.ac.hw.cs                 !
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