22 Oct
2012
22 Oct
'12
5:03 p.m.
From: Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com>
On 10/22/2012 03:22 PM, Chris Tofu wrote:
C: I never should have used the word platters. I was
talking about floppy disks mainly.
Then saying "floppy", "diskette" or similar would get your point
across.? Or you could use the term of art "cookie" if you wanted.
As I and others have said, you need to use a magnetic developer (I gave a bunch of them)
to make the domain walls visible.? Even so, if there's a media defect, that may not
help you.
I've never really found any reason not to use the Catweasel for this kind of thing.?
As with any other low-level tool (and the CW is VERY low-level), knowing what you're
doing is essential.? The one thing a CW gives you is a complete history of where the flux
changes occur, which means that you can add a missing one or remove an extraneous one.? It
works very well, if you're up to writing your own recovery tools.
C: Ok, but the Catweasel is no longer produced. And assuming I had one (preferably the
MKIV I supposed), would it be effective in reproducing data from *old* disks, say that
worked fine 1-5 years ago, but are just deteriorating due to basic age, or temperature
swings? Along w/the materials you described? It seems worth it to extract said data, even
if it requires a certain amount of *processing*.
?Is the Catweasel a difficult device to reproduce? How long can you expect a deteriorated
disk to last?