Error while Initialising Floppy Disk (Macintosh SE/30)

[HeartletTullius]

Hey everyone!

I ordered some floppy disks a few days back and they arrived today. All the Floppy Disks are 1.44MB High Density Disks, and they are all unformatted. However, I am having an issue with them. When I insert them into the Macintosh SE/30, I get the menu to initialise them, and then it goes through the "Initialisation" process. It says "Formatting Disk", then "Verifying Disk" and then it ejects the disk and it says "Initialisation Failed". Nothing else.

I'm very new to this, so I don't really know what could be causing this. The disks are unlocked and are not protected. How can I fix this? Thanks

 

[jimjimx]

Could be that the floppies have decayed, could be a bad drive / heads, could be that somehow a 800k drive ended up in the computer,.....

Does it read / write any other floppies?

Have you tried the new floppies in a different computer?

 

[HeartletTullius]

@jimjimx Hey! The wouldn't think that a 800K drive has ended up inside the computer. The computer hasn't been touched since 1991. I unfortunately can't check if it reads/writes other floppies. I didn't have any floppies up until today, and I don't have any formatted ones to check. I also can't check if they work with another computer due to me only having one vintage Macintosh (the one I'm trying to get the floppies into). 

Someone on reddit advised that I clean the "heads". Would I be able to do that without opening the machine? I don't have the tools nor the expertise to begin fiddling around in the there 8-o

 

[jimjimx]

@HeartletTullius 

There are still many 3.5” floppy cleaners on Amazon, eBay, and other sources. 

https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p2055359.m570.l1313.TR1.TRC0.A0.H0.Xfloppy+cleaner.TRS0&_nkw=floppy+cleaner&_sacat=0

https://www.amazon.com/s?k=Floppy+cleaner&ref=nb_sb_noss_2

https://www.walmart.com/ip/Nexhi-NXH-6000-3-5-in-Floppy-Drive-Cleaning-Kit-Premium-USB-Floppy-Drive-Cleaner/984021117?wmlspartner=wlpa&selectedSellerId=7484&adid=22222222227295539886&wl0=&wl1=g&wl2=t&wl3=359228956734&wl4=pla-831284190367&wl5=9021726&wl6=&wl7=&wl8=&wl9=pla&wl10=115070393&wl11=online&wl12=984021117&veh=sem&gclid=EAIaIQobChMImKS8lvCt5QIV-_7jBx2Z6gXMEAQYAyABEgJIk_D_BwE

 

[jimjimx]

Also. There are some videos on YouTube 

 

[LaPorta]

Clean the heads with a light swipe with a cotton swab and isopropyl alcohol.

 

[Dog Cow]

By the way, you can make any disk a cleaning disk. Take a disk that you don't value so much and use the cotton swab to brush on some isopropyl alcohol on both sides of the magnetic media. Just a single brush stroke per side with a saturated cotton tip will do.

 

[HeartletTullius]

@Dog Cow I'll try your way first! Just to be clear, is the magnetic media the circular metal part in the centre of the floppy disk? Thanks 

 

[Dog Cow]

@Dog Cow I'll try your way first! Just to be clear, is the magnetic media the circular metal part in the centre of the floppy disk? Thanks 

No, I mean the brown part that comes in contact with the disk drive's read/write heads. Just paint a single stripe of isopropyl alcohol on the top and bottom sides, and this will function reasonably well as a cleaning disk.