On Wed, May 03, 2006 at 02:02:10PM -0500, Mike McCarty wrote: > Andrew Sackville-West wrote: > >On Wed, May 03, 2006 at 12:34:59PM -0500, Mike McCarty wrote: > > [snip] > > >>Be sure that one of your discs is a 720K disc, and has been degaussed. > >>BTW, if it Just Works on high-mu discs, even when never formatted, > >>then I suspect that it will ruin your 720K disc. So make sure it's > >>one you don't mind losing. > > > > > >Agreed. though, as long as the magnetic media is intact, would not a > >low-level format "Rescue" a disc? not the data, but the usability of > >the disc. > > Probably not. Degaussing it properly would. But once the disc > has been magnetized with hi-coercion magnetic fields, attempting > to reformat it using lo-coercion fields fails in my experience.
\light goes on\ aha! I follow. thanks. > > >>I know I've got some 720K discs around > >>somewhere, one of which I could sacrifice... > > > > > >I don't have any of those :(. Further inspection also reveals that my > >floppies were formatted at the factory (says right on 'em, heh). And, > >after all these years of being careful with floppies, I can attest > >that its not so easy as you'd think to degauss a floppy. Things I've > > It only happens when you *don't* want it to happen. yep. > > >tried so far: > > > >big magnet on a 15" speaker > >microwave (he he) > > I'd think that would burn it up, not degauss it :-) a quick google search turned that up as a possible way to degauss a disk (including such other dubios methods as putting it in a vacuum cleaner). The reasoning was that the microwave would have a sufficient field strength to do it. Not. But if you leave it in long enough the metal shield over the access port will arc to the hub. That's pretty exciting! > > >ac motor on my drill press > >various fridge magnets wiped over the surface > >holding on my monitor while degaussing the monitor > > > >sheesh. > > > >somewhere around here I have a degausser for cassette tape > >heads... maybe that'll work if I can find it. > > Almost certainly will "work". Those things usually have small > area effect. You need to get large areas of the disc. > > Possibly just enough demagnetization to affect sector 1 of > track 0 head 0 is enough. yeah. no luck finding that thing. oh well. its fun anyway. A
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