Re: Floppy disk problem

Tech-Archive recommends: Fix windows errors by optimizing your registry

From: JAX (slipnslide_at_guesswhat.not)
Date: 02/09/04 

Date: Mon, 9 Feb 2004 15:25:01 -0700

Hi Nick,

I found the article on the web-site you have quoted to be rather difficult
to follow but, after trying everything else, with no success, I was able to
cure my chronic FD problems by installing the 3 mode driver from that site.
I had a friend format a floppy and write to it on his 98 machine, as well as
one with a 2K machine. We were able to move floppies from one to the other
with my XP machine. The most important thing to me is, I have a camera that
uses floppies, NO SWEAT!

It seems to me that some XP install CD's have defective floppy drivers and
some don't. The reason I have come to this conclusion is, some people post
and say they have no problem at all. I've tried every suggestion I could
find including changing FDD's 3 or 4 times. The 3 mode driver seems to be
the "Silver Bullet" for the problem.

Thanks for passing the information in your post to others.

Cheers, JAX

"Nick Burns" <thedoc@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:u3JGLf17DHA.1672@TK2MSFTNGP12.phx.gbl...
>
> "Lori" <anonymous@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
> news:d3a201c3ef3d$d1343910$a001280a@phx.gbl...
> > Hi,
> > I have several new HP desktops. I am finding that all of
> > them have sporadic problems with reading/formatting
> > floppies. I have tried several new, different brands of
> > floppies in these drives. Sometimes they format fine,
> > sometimes they get to the end of the format and tell me it
> > cannot format.
> > Any ideas?
> > Thank you!
>
>
>
> This article has the fix and link to the drivers, I have used on several
> machines now and works perfect.
>
> At our school we are having all the floppy problems mentioned in this
NG.The
> only one that is 100% reproducable is this: take a floppy, format it
> inWin9x, and put files on it. Stick it in an XP PC and select "Copy
> Disk"from the A: drive context menu. We get errors nearly 100% of the
time.
> Ifound the following fix
>
at:http://discuss.extremetech.com/n/mb/display.asp?webtag=extremetech&msg=21
> 301.1 posted by someone called cluberti. The drivers he mentions work,
> butthey leave a phantom B: 5.25 drive that needs to be
>
disabled.-------------------------------------------------------------------
> ----------------------------------I looked at everything I could find, and
> everything technically SHOULD bethe same in the way Windows 98 and Windows
> XP format and access floppydiskettes (FAT12, 512bytes/sector, etc). And
> what did I find? As usual,things have changed (and you wouldn't know it
> unless you dug deep). Thefollowing is what I found (and how I fixed it -
> get this information OUTTHERE): After beating my head against the wall for
a
> few weeks and polling everyoneI knew personally that was running Windows
XP,
> I found that quite a few ofus had this problem - format and/or use a
floppy
> in XP, it doesn't work inWin98 (and sometimes Windows 2000 too). Format
> and/or use a floppy inWindows 95, 98, ME, NT, or 2000, it no longer works
in
> XP (even if it workedbefore). It seemed that the brand name PC's had this
> problem lessfrequently than a white box machine, but they were not immune
> either -especially Compaq PC's. So, I dug around google groups for a
while,
> andfound LOTS of people complaining of this particular problem. However,
> quitea few searches on Microsoft's site about floppies, corruption, and
> WindowsXP turned up absolutely nothing of value. After LOTS of digging, I
> did find this interesting Microsoft Q
> article(http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q309623)
> that I hadoriginally perused and thought of no use. I read it again, very
> CAREFULLY,and read it over a few times more to make sure what I was
reading
> was reallythere. If you're interested, read it in all it's glory on the
> Microsoftsite and be amazed - then come back (open a new tab or window!
:O)
> here forthe fix. For those of you not inclined to visit Microsoft.com (and
> you know who youare ;O), here's the interesting tidbit (and the root of
the
> problem): "Windows XP supports formatting only the 1.44MB disk format.
> Three-modefloppy drives (drives that are capable of reading/writing with
> 720KB, 1.2MBand 1.44MB 3.5" disks) requires special driver support, and
> support for thisfeature is not included in Windows XP. Some 3mode FD
drivers
> may be installed on PCs with Windows XP by OEMs,although Microsoft does
not
> provide the end-user support for 3mode drivers.Please contact your OEM
> (Original Equipment Manufacturer) if you have anyquestions on 3mode
> drivers." Why did they remove something that every other version of
Windows
> has? Idon't know either. Nonetheless, support is gone in the Microsoft
> floppydriver for Windows XP. Now, I have two white box PC's - one with a
> Mitsumi floppy and one with aSony floppy disk drive. Both drives support
> reading/writing/formatting of720K, 1.2MB and 1.44MB floppies (hence
"3mode"
> floppy). Notice in the Qarticle that if the drive supports formatting of
> anything more than 1.44MBfloppies, it isn't supported! Since *most*
floppy
> disk drives from Japanesevendors (Sony, Mitsumi, etc) are 3 mode, does
this
> mean a lot of people willbe in the same boat? It appears so. It so
happens
> that my 2 machines were running Windows XP Pro - as previouslystated, one
> has a Mitsumi floppy, and one has a Sony floppy. Both were quadbooting,
> running Debian Linux (Woody), Windows 98 SE, Windows 2000 (one hasSP2, one
> has SP3), and Windows XP Professional (one has SP1, one does not).Both
PC's
> were basically identical in software loads, and both PC's had thesame
> problem; XP wouldn't read a floppy diskette formatted in Linux orWin98,
and
> Linux and Win98 were running ON THE SAME MACHINE. I could formatthe
floppy
> to 1.44MB in Windows XP, but then I couldn't read it in Win98(Linux would
> read the floppy); swapping formatted floppies amongst machinesproduced the
> same results. This meant that it wasn't a hardware problem, itwas an XP
> problem - more specifically, a driver problem. So I went looking for a
3mode
> floppy driver. First, I tried the Windows2000 stock floppy driver. No
go.
> I tried the Windows ME floppy driver.Again, no go. I tried the Windows 98
> floppy driver. Nada. It took me a day or two more, but I found one at
> http://www.viaarena.com.This driver is for Windows XP Embedded, but works
> just fine in Windows XP.I had to force the driver in (Windows XP wouldn't
> take it using the normaldriver update process), but I now have no problems
> with my floppy drive. Isuggest you download this before they pull it in
> violation of the DMCA orsomething ;O) Here's the link to the
> driver:http://downloads.viaarena.com/WinXPE/Oct02/XPe_3mflp132_v10.zip And
> here are the steps necessary to install it (make sure there isn't afloppy
> disk in the drive!): 1. Download driver. 2. Unzip the driver somewhere (I
> keep all of my drivers inC:\Drivers\<Driver>, so I extracted it to
> C:\Drivers\3mode). 3. Open Windows XP's Device Manager, expand the "Floppy
> disk controllers"heading, and double-click the listing for "Standard
floppy
> disk controller". 4. Click the "Driver" tab, then click the "Update
Driver"
> button. 5. Select the "Install from a list or specific location" radio
> button andclick the "Next" button. 6. Select the "Don't search. I will
> choose the driver to install." radiobutton and click the "Next" button. 7.
> Click the "Have Disk" button; then, click the "Browse" button. Browse
tothe
> location that you extracted the files to in step 2 and double click
> the"VIA3MFPY.INF" file. Then, click the "OK" button. 8. You should now
have
> "VIA 3-mode floppy controller" highlighted in thedrivers list. Click the
> "Next" button to begin the driver file copy. Oncethe file copy is
complete,
> your floppy disk drive will access 3 times(checking all 3 "modes"). This
is
> normal. Click the "Finish" button whenthe driver installation is
complete.
> 9a. You may, or may not, have a device labeled "Unknown Device" in
the"Other
> Devices" heading in Device Manager. If so, continue with step 9a.If not,
> skip to step 9b. If you have a device labeled "Unknown Device" inthe
"Other
> Devices" heading in Device Manager, right-click on it and select"Update
> Driver". Follow steps 5 through 8 to complete the installation of"Floppy
> disk drive" (note that the naming of the driver in the drivers listin step
8
> may be different during this step - this is normal). Once you'veclicked
the
> "Finish" button, continue on to step 10. 9b. If you do not have a device
> labeled "Unknown Device" in the "OtherDevices" heading in Device Manager,
> expand the "Floppy disk drives" headingin Device Manager and double-click
> the listing for "Floppy disk drive".Follow steps 4 through 8 to complete
the
> installation of "Floppy disk drive"(note that the naming of the driver in
> the drivers list in step 8 may bedifferent during this step - this is
> normal). Once you've clicked the"Finish" button, continue on to step 10.
> 10. Reboot your PC. This should let you know if all of your hard
workREALLY
> paid off. Check the Device Manager one last time to be sure that younow
> have the "VIA 3-mode floppy controller listed under the "Floppy
> diskcontrollers" heading. Put a file on a floppy in Win98 (or another
> non-XPOS) and you should now be able to access it in Windows XP (and
> vice-versa)without issue. You made it! Pass this
>
on!-------------------------------------------------------------------------
> -----------------------------Microsoft needs to get this fixed.
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

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