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Does anybody know how to revive a dead (old) floppy disk? I have one with all my mother’s family contact and health information, etc. on it that I never bothered to convert to a disk because the only time I use it is when I update something but when I tried to open it the other night the message says something like floppy needs to be formatted – apparently it unformatted itself (is unformatted a word?) I would be forever grateful if anybody could revive it.
Whatever you do, do not allow the computer to format it. It will erase everything on it for sure. Sadly it is pretty unlikely you will be able to recover the information on it. If your computer won’t read it as it is now I would consider the disk dead. I’m sorry.
Hopefully you can regather the information you need elsewhere & once you do, make sure you burn it onto a rewritable DVD or CD, so that you can update it & not have to worry about it breaking down & losing the information like the floppy did.
*hugs*, Wish I had better news for you.
Kyrin
You may wish to try a free demo of a program designed to retrieve data in situations like this.
http://www.jufsoft.com/badcopy/floppy_recovery.asp
That’s one example, however I CAN’T promise that there aren’t viruses with free software downloads! I had very good experience with SpotMau myself in retriving files when my OS got wiped out by a virus, but SpotMau doesn’t seem to specialize in floppies, or give a free demo.
I suppose the best programs out there would entail purchasing software, but I don’t know how much that lost information is worth to you, money-wise.
I hope you’re able to retrieve it somehow! 🙁
My very first job as a student computer lab assistant included helping students with floppy disks. I can’t tell you how many tearful students cried tears of joy when I ran Norton Disk Doctor on their corrupted floppies and saved their important research papers and whatnot. It was my favorite part of the job.
Unless you’re running a very old machine, you might not have the program, but it has been incorporated into Windows software. This article should be helpful:
http://www.brighthub.com/computing/smb-security/articles/104771.aspx
Best of luck!!!
(Oh–the instructions on running the Windows-incorporated version of NDD are at the bottom of the article, BTW.)
Yay for computer geeks, I am hoping that one of these things might help you Darjeb. I’m sorry I wasn’t much help, but floppy disks are so outdated these days, I wouldn’t have a clue how to save one, & I know they are prone to dying for no apparent reason.
Good luck!
Do save the info on something more durable if you do save it, your Hard drive would be good with a rewritable CD/DVD backup, more places you have it, the better your chances of not having something destroy the information.
Kyrin
Yay for computer geeks, I am hoping that one of these things might help you Darjeb. I’m sorry I wasn’t much help, but floppy disks are so outdated these days, I wouldn’t have a clue how to save one, & I know they are prone to dying for no apparent reason.
Kyrin
Floppies die randomly because they store the information magnetically like credit card strips. If they get exposed to a magnet it can wipe them. They can also lose their magnetism or have it change over time. As soon as the pattern changes or fades too much bye bye info. Hard drives are magnetic too but are much bigger, stable and high tech. CDs and DVDs are more reliable because the info is more or less laser engraved on the disc. At least the writable ones are anyway. I think premade ones might molded or something like that. Hopefully this all makes sense and isn’t too much info.
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