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Nagging Floppy Drive Problem

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Prizef1ghter

Weaksauce
Joined
Jun 10, 2004
Messages
105
For a long time now I have been having this problem.

Insert a floppy into the drive and try to read from it or access it in any way and the PC hangs for a while then it says that the disk is not formatted, would I like to format it now. Of course, when I choose yes for format, it cannot do the task. I have verified that all the cables are connected correctly. The LED does NOT stay on indicating it was backwards. This happens with any floppy I try and they are all working floppies as they were read in another PC. In a general sense, I have been able to live with this because I mainly use bootable CD's and whatnot.

I've googled this problem and haven't found any solutions. The drive is brand new. The drive before that this problem was happening on was brand new. I think 25 dollars is enough money to realize that its not a hardware/dust issue. I recently built a system for a friend of mine with all brand new parts. He is having the same issue, from the start.

I use WinXP SP1 (not gonna go SP2 yet). I mention the OS because I never had this problem before I upgraded from Win2KPro. This problem isn't mentioned in the MSKB that I could find either.

I tried to let windows reinstall the driver from hardware properties which it does seemingly without a hitch. The drive is seen normally on POST.

Does anybody has any ideas or a solution?
 
Hrmmm... That is a toughy but is not completely unsolvable. I would have replied sooner but I'm not at work. ;)

Option 1:
How familiar are you with Linux? My first suggestion is to download and burn a copy of Knoppix: http://csociety-ftp.ecn.purdue.edu/pub/knoppix/KNOPPIX_V3.6-2004-08-16-EN.iso
It's a live Linux CD which means you can boot your system into Linux without having to install it or mess with the data on your drives. See if you can read a KNOWN good floppy, not one you've already tried.

Option 2:
Do you have a spare hard drive? Disconnect your main drive (with the machine off, DUH! :p ) and connect up a spare drive. Anything 4 GB or larger will be perfectly fine. Install Windows XP and basic drivers (video, chipset, net) to get the system functional. Then see if you can read a known good disk that you have not already tried. If that works, add one driver back at a time until all your drivers are installed while trying the drive after each one.

Of course check your BIOS first, make sure it's set for the right kind of floppy drive. 1.44MB and not 720K or something crazy like that. If it has floppy mode 3, that won't cause any issues but it's safer to disable it. Mode 3 was for Japanese floppy drives and older tape drives.

If the drive won't read disks after either one of the above, the confirmation is to take it to a buddy's house and connect it to his system and see if he can read a known good disk with it. The two options I listed rule out software as the problem and put it soley on hardware at that point. I had the same problem and it turned out I had a bad drive to begin with, damaged a few of my disks which when I used in a new drive damaged its read/write heads making that drive bad.:mad: That's why I said NOT to use floppies you've already tried. As a matter of fact, I just threw those damn things out. :D
 
I'll try the Linux thing when I get some time.

The BIOS has it set at 1.44 correctly

Ya know, I really, really wish it was hardware but after 3 drives of my own (old one, new, new + the new I built for my friend). There's gotta be a software issue somewhere.

If someone with a working floppy set their bios to the incorrect size would it display the same symptoms?
 
Im in the middle of downloading the Knoppix thing. I'll try my hand at another floppy drive. A good friend of mine has a small cache of em.
 
But I must add. Its kinda strange that of all the drives I swapped out, they seem to work fine in another box. Another reason why it can't be the hardware. I mean, there has to be some consistancy somewhere if the hardware is bad, right?
 
Prizef1ghter said:
But I must add. Its kinda strange that of all the drives I swapped out, they seem to work fine in another box. Another reason why it can't be the hardware. I mean, there has to be some consistancy somewhere if the hardware is bad, right?
Click to expand...

Usually, but not always. Now when you say they work fine in another box, do they work fine with the same disks you've tried before.

The reason I suggested Knoppix was to rule it as software or hardware. If the drive doesn't work in Knoppix, it's hardware guaranteed. If it does work fine, then it's something f'ed up in XP.
Worst case scenario, the floppy controller on your motherboard is bad which is RMA'able
 
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