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Conference 7.286::atarist

Title:Atari ST, TT, & Falcon
Notice:Please read note 1.0 and its replies before posting!
Moderator:FUNYET::ANDERSON
Created:Mon Apr 04 1988
Last Modified:Tue May 06 1997
Last Successful Update:Fri Jun 06 1997
Number of topics:1433
Total number of notes:10312

360.0. "Spring cleaning in order?" by EVETPU::BRAMHALL (Mark Bramhall) Tue Jan 03 1989 18:11

    We've had our Atari 1040ST from about 18 months now.  We use it mostly
    for games (and why not).  The room it is in gets quite dusty.  Not only
    do we heat the room with wood all winter long, but we own seven (yes,
    7) Golden Retrievers for whom the room is home.  I do vacuum, trying to
    get what dust I can, from time-to-time.  But, we seem to have two
    problems:
    
    1) One of our games (Bard's Tale) will not load about 50% of the time.
    It sure looks like misreads of the disk (we've only the internal double
    sided floppy).  Turning the system off and waiting a while and/or when
    the room is colder (wood heat is not very stable in temperature), the
    game will load OK.
    
    2) Occasionally, for no apparent reason, we'll lose a game disk or a
    desk-top disk.  Again, it looks like disk error(s).
    
    My question is whether, given the dusty conditions the 1040ST lives in,
    should I do some much more extensive cleaning of the floppy drive
    and/or the whole system.  Should I have it "professionally" cleaned?
    Where would be a good place for doing same?
T.RTitleUserPersonal
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360.1Clean the disk, not the driveCSOA1::FISHERAl FisherTue Jan 03 1989 20:2218
    I had a problem with a disk that my 5 yr old placed in our crawl
    space. It sat there for several months and when I found it it would
    not load at all. I cleaned the surface of the disk with an alcohol
    pad!!! I carefully slide the little metal door open, cleaned the
    section of the disk that I could see, rotated the disk
    inside the jacket, and so forth all the way around the disk.
    Works great, has loaded every time since then.
    
    Word of warning though - do NOT use rubbing alcohol. Find someone
    in Field Service and have them get you some TEX pads. They are 99.9%
    pure alcohol. If you must you could go to a drug store and get some
    of this very pure alcohol. Remember - do NOT use plain old rubbing
    alcohol.
    
    Good Luck...
    
    Al