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Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!portal!atari!jwt
From: jwt@atari.UUCP (Jim Tittsler)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.8bit
Subject: Re: Disk drive problems
Message-ID: <892@atari.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 23-Nov-87 22:07:06 EST
Article-I.D.: atari.892
Posted: Mon Nov 23 22:07:06 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 28-Nov-87 16:00:23 EST
References: <8711190814.AA15522@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU>
Organization: Atari Corp., Sunnyvale, CA
Lines: 11
Summary: Why 288 RPM?

In article <8711190814.AA15522@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU>, BALLEWS@BAYLOR.BITNET (Scott Ballew) writes:

> Atari decided their drives should run at 288 RPM! (Does anyone know WHY?!)

At 288 RPM you have a little better than 8 mS more per revolution (compared to
300 RPM) which gives you time to squeeze that "one last (128 byte) sector"
(and gap) onto a track.  The bit density on the media is slightly higher
than normal.  At 300 RPM, you would have gotten one fewer sector per track
(without shrinking the gaps, and thereby reducing margin).

Jim Tittsler	{ames, pyramid, imagen, sun, portal}!atari!jwt