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Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!rutgers!cbmvax!daveh
From: daveh@cbmvax.cbm.UUCP (Dave Haynie)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Monitor degaussers and Micro Floppies
Message-ID: <1496@cbmvax.cbmvax.cbm.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 5-Mar-87 12:24:29 EST
Article-I.D.: cbmvax.1496
Posted: Thu Mar  5 12:24:29 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 7-Mar-87 05:21:31 EST
References: <474@oscvax.UUCP>
Organization: Commodore Technology, West Chester, PA
Lines: 29

> Just the other day, I was trying to corrupt a Macintosh disk so that I could
> re-format it as single-sided.  So I took the disk and but it in front of
> this big Hitachi monitor that I use and hit the DEGAUSS button, I held
> it there for a while with the button down until the screen stopped
> doing the funny things it does during degaussing, then waited for a while
> and repeated this several times.  The net effect on the disk was.... nil.
> The Mac read the disk sans hitch.  No files lost or anything.  What does
> this tell me?  The chance of accidentally wiping out a disk by exposure
> to a monitor's electro-magentic fields is virtually zero.

No, actually, this tells you that the chance of random electromagnetic
fields wiping out a disk is directly proportional to the importance of that
disk's information.  Is is a well known relationship.  Since the data on
the second side of that disk not only wasn't important to you, but was
actually getting in your way, the chances of it being damaged at all were
very close to NIL.  A stronger field will be required.

> 	-Rico
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