5.25" Floppy disk drive not recognized

[Jin Guojun[VFF]]

On 08/14/20 11:10, Jin Guojun[VFF] wrote:
> On 08/14/20 09:34, Tomasz CEDRO wrote:
>> On Fri, Aug 14, 2020 at 6:14 PM Don Wilde wrote:
>>> On 8/14/20 8:45 AM, Tomasz CEDRO wrote:
>>>> Is floppy drive still available? Was it supposed to be removed..?
>>> It's still in the GENERIC kernel configuration. Disk Doctors, if you
>>> have one local, should be able to tell you whether the diskette itself
>>> is readable and formatted.
>> Good news, thank you :-) There was a discussion somewhere around 2017
>> to remove it.. I am glad floppies are still here and will stay here
>> :-) I am fan of retro computers and this may come handy :-)
>>
>> https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-arch/2017-December/018681.html 
>>
>>
> We still have it :-)
>
> # mount_msdosfs -o ro /dev/fd0 /mnt
> # ll /mnt
> total 2131
> drwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel    7168 Dec 31  1979 ./
> drwxr-xr-x  24 root  wheel    1024 Aug 14 10:50 ../
> -rwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel    6883 Dec 30  1993 ADDHELP.OV_*
> -rwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel   28962 Dec 30  1993 DBLSPACE.BI_*
> -rwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel     302 Dec 30  1993 DBLSPACE.SYS*
> -rwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel     744 Dec 30  1993 DOSUMB.CO_*
> -rwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel  175485 Dec 30  1993 IBMAVD.EX_*
> -rwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel   78253 Dec 30  1993 IBMAVSP.EX_*
> ...
> # umount /mnt
>
> --- change to a bad floppy disk
>
> # dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/fd0 bs=18k
> dd: /dev/fd0: Input/output error
> 1+0 records in
> 0+0 records out
> 0 bytes transferred in 3.943048 secs (0 bytes/sec)
> ^C
> # fdformat -f 1440 /dev/fd0
> Format 1440K floppy `/dev/fd0'? (y/n): y
> Processing EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE done.
> Errors encountered:
> Cyl Head Sect   Error
>   0    0    1   no address mark in ID field
>   0    1    1   no address mark in ID field
>   1    0    1   no address mark in ID field
>   1    1    1   no address mark in ID field
>   2    0    1   no address mark in ID field
>   2    1    1   no address mark in ID field
>   3    0    1   no address mark in ID field
>   3    1    1   no address mark in ID field
>   4    0    1   no address mark in ID field
>   4    1    1   no address mark in ID field
> (Further errors not printed.)
>
> # uname -a
> FreeBSD f114 11.4-RELEASE FreeBSD 11.4-RELEASE #0: Sun Aug  9 23:48:49 
> PDT 2020
>     root at f114:/usr/src/sys/amd64/compile/MinMax  amd64
>
reFormating it to lower density make the floppy has some useful.

The floppy disk does not last long. Event leave it in a box without use, 
the media will age.

# fdformat -f 720 /dev/fd0
Format 720K floppy `/dev/fd0'? (y/n): y
Processing VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVEE done.
Errors encountered:
Cyl Head Sect   Error
  76    1    2   CRC error in data field
  78    1    2   CRC error in data field
  79    1    2   CRC error in data field

# dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/fd0 bs=18k count=10k
dd: /dev/fd0: end of device
41+0 records in
40+0 records out
737280 bytes transferred in 48.023818 secs (15352 bytes/sec)