Floppy (A:) Drive won't work

Every time I insert a floppy disk and try to save something on it I get an error message saying:

"The disk in drive A is not formatted. Do you want to format it now?"

I click yes and this window pops up:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v103/KittyPie7/format.jpg

After clicking format, it disables the window for a minute and then pops up with another error message saying:

"Windows cannot format this drive. Quit any disk utilities or other programs that are using this drive, and make sure that no window is displaying the contents of the drive. Then try formatting again."

I close out of the window and it tells me the disk in drive A cannot be formatted.

I didn't have the window open displaying the contents of the disk and as far as I know there weren't any disk utilities running.. so I was wondering if anyone knows a solution?

 

Check the floppys that you are using, they have a lock on the back side, be sure the lock is slid forward towards the insert side, have you had the floppy cable unhooked latley? ed

 

I know that the floppies worked on this computer before. Whats this about the floppy cable?

 

If your light on the front of the floppy stays on when not in use your cable is on upside down at the floppy.

 

Reformat (full format) the floppy, wait until the light is off and remove it. Put it back and try again. If this does not work, maybe the floppy is broken. If it's the same for every floppy you try, maybe your drive died. But try the cable thing before coming to that conclusion

Edit: see you can't format it (/me makes note to read better next time), maybe try a format on another computer or try formatting it from dos. If you have a live CD of some linux distro lying around, you can try formatting using this. There's no way there will be software interference that way.

 

Hate to say this, but I too have forgotten the dang "Lock" Tabs on floppies, but another simple one is a dirty Read/Write head on the floppy drive, a cleaning disk is the solution. You can also disable the offending floppy and then reenable it this sometimes works, also check the floppy driver and update. Hope that helps

 

I've discovered that Windows Format can exhibit some interesting behavior. I call it interesting and not "buggy" because it may be intentional behavior. I just don't know enough to decide. I always format new floppy disks and then I make a little mark on the disk to indicate that it has received a full and fresh format. I know, they're preformatted but I do it anyways. Now, I also have Linux and I have reformatted the same new disk to have 1.6 meg by formatting it at 10 sectors per track instead of the usual 9 sectors per track. I put a large PDF file on the disk - 1.54 meg copied from my Linux box. I took that disk next door to a friend's house and I copied the file onto his WinXP machine for perusing while we set up a new Linux box for him. The file was fine, the disk was fine. When I got back home I had no need of the PDF file, so I formatted it on my WinXP machine. But it would NOT format. It tried, but gave up saying that the disk couldn't be formatted. I'd previously had it in my pocket - it was a hot day - so maybe I damaged it. No. I formatted the floppy on my Linux machine just fine, and this time I formatted using 9 sectors per track. I immediately took the disk to my WinXP and formatted it. Yes - full format no problem. So I've concluded that Windows Format can't handle an unusual number of sectors per track. This may occur, if it's trying to save information, already on the disk - I don't know. So, as a test, I formatted that disk once more with 10 sectors per track. Once again, Windows couldn't format it. Then I pressed the floppy up against my CRT monitor near the edge of the screen, where the de-gaussing coils are. When I powered on the CRT I was hoping the coil woiuld damage the formatting so that Windows Format would work. Sure enough. There must have been enough disruption, because Format worked once more. Like I said - very interesting.

 

Interesting indeed, even if it's not the solution i'll remember this one!

 

In the tradition of the Major Geeks goal to provide the best possible helpful information, my previous anecdotal reference to M$ windows Format program needs a bit of clarification. I decided to test a couple of variables to try to follow a repeatable (perhaps scientific) method. I bought 2 different brands of floppy disk. I even researched the brands to make sure they were independant of each other. Next, I decided to test each disk with a variety of formats. I have 2 computers to check this with - 1) Linux OS and 2) XP OS. I used the Linux OS to do all the initial formats.
Test1: format new disks ( brands A and B ) with standard 80 track, 512 bytes/sector, 18 sectors.
Result: Linux perfect, XP perfect ( verified with a 1.2 meg PDF document file)
Test2:format on Linux 80 track, 1024 bytes/sector, 9 sectors. Format the same disk(s) with XP format.
Result: Linux perfect, XP perfect
Test3:format on Linux 80 track, 1024 bytes/sector, 10 sectors. Format the same disk(s) with XP format.
Result: Linux perfect, XP format failed.

These results were expected, however, there is an important variable that should be tested. The floppy drive in the Linux machine is a 6 year old Hitachi and the floppy in the XP machine is a 1 year old Sony. I exchanged the floppy drives in each machine. Then I re-ran the test.

Test4: format new disks ( brands A and B ) with standard 80 track, 512 bytes/sector, 18 sectors.
Result: Linux perfect, XP perfect
Test5:format on Linux 80 track, 1024 bytes/sector, 9 sectors. Format the same disk(s) with XP format.
Result: Linux perfect, XP perfect
Test6:format on Linux 80 track, 1024 bytes/sector, 10 sectors. Format the same disk(s) with XP format.
Result: Linux perfect, XP format perfect.

So XP Format worked well, with the old Hitachi in place, but failed with the new Sony floppy. It was tempting to jump to a conclusion regarding the relative merits of the two floppy drives, so another test was required.

I replaced the Hitachi drive in the Linux box and for each brand of disk I re-created the 3 formats:
Disk 1: 80 track, 512 bytes/sector, 18 sectors( 1.47MB)
Disk 2: 80 track, 1024 bytes/sector, 9 sectors( 1.47MB)
Disk 3: 80 track, 1024 bytes/sector, 10 sectors( 1.64MB)
Then I installed the Sony drive in the Linux box and with the Linux OS ran the following test.

Test7:format over disk 1 with 80 track, 512 bytes/sector, 18 sectors
Result: perfect
Test7:format over disk 2 with 80 track, 512 bytes/sector, 18 sectors
Result: perfect
Test7:format over disk 3 with 80 track, 512 bytes/sector, 18 sectors
Result: perfect

The Sony floppy disk drive, was OK on the Linux OS but failed on the XP OS. So what have I learned?
The degaussing coil around the edge of a CRT display is a useful disk eraser. Some floppy drives ( my Hitachi) have stronger magnetizing flux and may cause some drives (my Sony) to have difficulty redoing their formatting. Since the Linux-OS can successfully re-format floppy disks over various existing formats and the XP-OS seems to fail, I've concluded that Windows Format gives up too soon. If it can't "undo" a formatting mark with a given number of tries, it fails. The Linux-OS probably tries, just a few more times before it gives up.

To clarify, further; there is no Hitachi vs Sony issue at work here. It is actually "old" vs "new". My "old" Hitachi was designed to work well on 1.44 Meg disk formats. It will format to 1.64MB, but higher capacity formats fail. The Sony floppy drive, on the other hand, has just formatted a box of disks at 1.96MB without errors! For those keeping score, that's 80 track, 1024 bytes/sector, 12 sectors. I believe that the lower head flux is responsible for allowing this. This higher capacity format is also readable by the Hitachi, floppy drive, even under Windows, if they're formatted with dual File Allocation Tables.(FAT).

Your question, may remain unanswered, Jackie, but I seem to have answered one of my own.

 

what's a floppy??


Sorry to stray, but i had to say it.

honestly, i would try a cleaning disk, it's a floppy disk usually with a white cloth inside and some alcohol solution to put on it. thats usually the culprit.