[SOLVED] Floppy Disk Lost Formatting

[Plicker19]

My 3 1/2 floppies lost their formatting. Is there a way to recover them? Thanks!

 

[USAFRet]

My 3 1/2 floppies lost their formatting. Is there a way to recover them? Thanks!

How long were these sitting in the desk drawer, unused?
By 'recover', do you mean whatever data might have been on them, or just the functionality of the floppy?

 

[Plicker19]

Probably fifteen years. Sector editor may work?

 

[LWFG001]

I've never heard of a 3 1/2" floppy disk losing its formatting. Usually the disk was damaged somehow or the floppy disk drive went bad and cannot read them.

1. You are saying that you inserted floppy disks into a computer with a 3 1/2" floppy disk drive and got an error message right? What is the exact error message?

2. Did you try placing another floppy disk in the floppy disk drive and seeing if it reads that disk? Sometimes one floppy disk has a problem and the rest are fine.

3. Did you try placing one of the floppy disks into another floppy disk drive? Sometimes the floppy disks are fine but a specific floppy disk drive has stopped working and you need to use another drive.

 

[USAFRet]

Probably fifteen years. Sector editor may work?

Might a "sector editor" work?
Possibly, probably not.
But if you knew how to use that, you would have just done it and see what happens...

Maybe try a different floppy drive, before blindly poking around with a hex editor on the actual data.
Additionally, you don't mess with the data on these floppies. You instead do a sector by sector clone to some other media, and poke around in there.

What could possibly be on these 15 year old floppies that is "important"?

 

[Plicker19]

I am experimenting with older technonlogy. I get that question a lot.

 

[USAFRet]

I am experimenting with older technonlogy. I get that question a lot.

So, disks can go bad.
Mold, mag layer flaking off, left in a hot attic for (15) years...

If it won't reformat in the drive, let it go.
Or try a different floppy drive.

 

[mdd1963]

Many of the metallic-coated platter surfaces oxidize after years of exposure to even room temperature.

I'd expect all/most stored outside of Arizona to be worthless....

 

[fzabkar]

Retract the metal shutter and examine the surface while rotating the hub with your finger. Look for mouldy spots. If you find any scratches, then check for head contamination in your floppy drive.