home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
Collection of Tools & Utilities
/
Collection of Tools and Utilities.iso
/
dskut
/
diskanl.zip
/
DISKANL.DOC
< prev
next >
Wrap
Text File
|
1987-12-06
|
4KB
|
105 lines
DISKANL.COM - DISKETTE ANALYZER
PROGRAM DOCUMENTATION
by Kevin Patz
BBS: (603) 228-3820
GEnie: KPATZ
CompuServe: 73007,3311
DISKANL.COM is a program designed to find and identify errors
on floppy disks. It is compatible with all standard DOS-for
matted diskettes: 5.25" (single or double-sided, 8-9 sectors per
track), 5.25" high-density 1.2M (AT), 3.5" 720K diskettes, and
3.5" 1.4M diskettes.
DISTRIBUTION: Unmodified copies of DISKANL may be dis
tributed freely with this documentation as long as profit is not
involved.
PROGRAM OPERATION
DISKANL is designed to work on floppy disks only. Hard disks
are not supported at this time, and specifying a hard disk drive
will result in an "invalid drive" message.
To use DISKANL, type DISKANL at the DOS prompt (specify a
drive and/or subdirectory if DISKANL is not in the current
directory on the default drive). You'll be asked to insert the
diskette to be tested into drive A. If you want to test a
diskette in drive B (or other floppy drive), put the drive letter
after the DISKANL command, such as DISKANL B:. Insert the
diskette into the drive indicated and press any key to begin
testing.
DISKANL will begin by identifying the diskette type, and
will report the number of tracks (cylinders), heads, and sectors
per track. The program will then read the diskette track by
track, indicating the current track on the screen. If an error
is found, a message will appear indicating the nature of the
error and the location (track, side, sector) of the error.
Disk errors can be caused by one of the following conditions:
The diskette is damaged, either physically (a defect on the
surface or damage such as a fingerprint) or magnetically (the
disk was placed too close to a magnetic object).
The diskette is copy-protected. Copy protection schemes
either create an oddly formatted track or puts intentional disk
errors on the disk. Both conditions can cause DISKANL to report
errors. DISKANL can help to detect whether a disk is copy-
protected or damaged.
Errors that DISKANL can detect:
Track xx head xx is blank: No sectors were found on this track.
Either the diskette wasn't completely formatted or it is copy-
protected.
CRC error in ID field: A sector ID field (identifying
information for the sector) contains a CRC (cyclic redundancy
check) error. A CRC is a "check digit" placed at the end of the
ID and data areas used to determine if the data was read
correctly. A CRC error in the ID field is caused by some
protection schemes or by a damaged diskette.
Sector not found: One or more of the standard DOS-formatted
sectors could not be found on the track. A damaged diskette can
cause this error, and nearly every protection scheme will cause
this error.
CRC error in data field: The data read from the sector is
stable, but the CRC indicates that the data was not read
correctly. This error is caused by a copy protection scheme.
Weak bits - unreadable data: The data read from the sector is
unstable (different every time it's read). This is most likely
caused by a damaged spot on the diskette, but a few protection
schemes can cause it (particularly those using intentionally
damaged spots).
Address mark not found: The data address mark (a group of bytes
that identifies the start of the data field) was not found. A
number of protection schemes can cause this error, or the
diskette is damaged.
Track xx head xx is unrecognizable - probably copy-protected:
This error occurs when a time-out occurs when reading the track.
Some protection schemes with a large number of overlapping
sectors can cause this error. Removing the diskette from the
drive during analysis can also cause this error.
Other Errors:
Invalid drive letter specified: The drive you specified on the
command line is nonexistent or not a floppy drive.
Not enough memory: DISKANL requires at least 70K available
memory to run.
DOS 2.0 required: DISKANL will not run on versions of DOS
previous to 2.0.