On Jan 22, 1:30, Tony Duell wrote:
> > This can't be possible! Otherwise, why didn't someone exploit this to
> > make 4-sided diskettes??
>
> Because you don't gain any extra storage. Pete formated every other track
> on the disk using an 80-track drive (narrow heads). So in the end he had
> 80 tracks on each side (40 going in each direction). Since an 80 track
> drive can write 80 tracks anyway, there's no advantage in flipping the
> disk over.
Almost exactly. Actually, it was an accident. It was obviously a 40-track
flippy to start with, and at some time in the dim and distant past I must
have decided to use it "properly", two-sided. But only the second side had
been formatted in the flipped orientation, so although it was 40+40=80
tracks on one side it was only 40 on the other.
--
Pete Peter Turnbull
Dept. of Computer Science
University of York
Received on Thu Jan 21 1999 - 21:30:17 GMT