Fairlight-CMI

> 2. The disk heads are dirty.
> 
> - Use a cleaning disk or open the system and inspect the disk heads
> manually to find out whether any dirt (mainly dust and/or oxide) is
> present on the head. Clean using pure alcohol on a cotton swab. 

Bingo. I used a cleaning disk with alcohol - didn't help. Pulled both 
the drives, the heads on the second drive were *filthy*. Not 
surprised it couldn't read anything. Cleaned thoroughly with a swab & 
alcohol, everything fine.

Post-mortem showed the problem; the first disk I'd tried to format 
had two grooves where the oxide was totally worn off, on the outer 
tracks. All that oxide was on the heads. No idea how it came to 
happen, something must have gone drastically wrong when the heads 
loaded - it was a brand-new disk.

Everything fine now, system & QDOS disks backed up successfully.

Thanks!

Mike