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From: dougp@voodoo.ucsb.edu
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Is this odd?
Message-ID: <3309@hub.UUCP>
Date: 14 Dec 89 04:04:51 GMT
Sender: news@hub.UUCP
Organization: UC, Santa Barbara. Physics Computer Services
Lines: 16

-Message-Text-Follows-
In article <814@jc3b21.UUCP>, fgd3@jc3b21.UUCP (Fabbian G. Dufoe) writes...
>     A trick that I've used successfully with disks that wouldn't format
>clean is to pass them over a bulk tape eraser.  That seems to erase more
>from the disk than the format command does.  I guess the disk drive doesn't
>have nearly as high a level as the bulk eraser.
> 
>--Fabbian Dufoe

Format will only clean up the actual tracks, if there is spurious data
inbetween tracks, this can show up in the read signal and cause problems
this can occure if the disk was not erased after it was certified by
the manufacturer. The bulk eraser works because it erases the entire
disk, not just the tracks that the head actualy moves to.

Douglas Peale.