Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!rutgers!ucsd!ucbvax!hplabs!hpfcdc!hpldola!ritchie
From: ritchie@hpldola.HP.COM (Dave Ritchie)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: I love it!
Message-ID: <11830032@hpldola.HP.COM>
Date: 28 Jan 89 10:11:15 GMT
References: <7367@xanth.cs.odu.edu>
Organization: HP Elec. Design Div. -ColoSpgs
Lines: 23

/ hpldola:comp.sys.atari.st / scott@cs.odu.edu /  8:11 pm  Jan 24, 1989 /

>/tmp files...) and I was just wondering about all these formatting programs
>I see floating around.  9, 10 and now 11 sectors.... 80, 81 and now 82 tracks
>700, 800 and now I can format my disks with 923k.  Just when I thought it was
>safe to format a disk I found one with some sort of track offset (I just
>forgot the name... ) but it is supposed to speed up reading by 50% BUT
>even the docs say that it is NOT recommended!  WHAT IS THE DEAL?  Can any
>of these formatting procedure harm the drive by over extending a mechanism
>here or there?  Are there any real problems besides loss of data?
>   Scott D. Yelich                           scott@cs.odu.edu  [128.82.8.1] 

  These are 2 seperate problems. The use of tracks > 80 is dependent upon
the particular drive mechanism used - some will tolerate stepping past
track 80, some won't. The use of sectors > 9 per track is dependent upon
the rotational speed of the particular drive - 9 works best between different
computers, 10 will work with most, 11 will work with drives that are slower
than the standard 300 RPM (slower -> more time under head -> more time
for FDC chip to convert). I usually stick with the standard 9/80, being in
a post-college phase that allows me to buy disks, etc. :-> 10/80 should
be fairly safe I would think. How much TOS support non-standard formatting,
I do not know.
					dave