On Sunday, December 26, 1999 12:13 PM,  <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> when you put any disk in the floppy drive it trys to read it for about 20
> seconds and then says that the disk needs to be formatted, but  it wont
let
> me do that either. It trys to read it and then says capacity does not
match
> and i am using 1.44 disk like i always did.Thanks in advance for any
> suggestions.

Here are a few things to check for-- first, be sure it is the diskette and
not the floppy drive itself that is causing problems. You indicated in your
post that it does this to other floppies. Try reading these disk on a
different computer. These additional tests should help you      determine
whether the trouble is in the floppy diskette or the  floppy drive. Please
be aware that a floppy drive that is about to fail may read some diskettes,
but not others. This happens most often on older systems in which the floppy
drive has slipped out of alignment.
Was the diskette formatted on your system or another, such as a
office computer? If the floppy was formatted on an improperly aligned
drive, other systems may have trouble reading it, because formatting
determines where data is to be stored on a disk.
If you get the same error message on other computers and your disk drive
otherwise checks out, start looking for problems with the floppy itself.
Run ScanDisk or another utility such as Norton Utilities to errors on the
disk's surface. If problems are revealed, follow the prompts that appear on
your screen to try and correct them. If any of these procedures allow you to
access the floppy, assume it may only be temporary. Copy the most important
files first to your hard drive and then re-copy them to a different floppy.
HTH.  :-)

Walter R. Worth
[log in to unmask]

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