Hey ratfink,

maybe there is hope for you. First let me ask which OS do you use?
I discovered myself that sometimes Windows 2000/Windows XP can't read a floppy but Windows 98 SE can.

If there's alright and the disk seems to be defect, you can try to find some tools for data recovery. A good tool in the good old DOS-years was Norton DiskEdit. Never used that program but maybe my father got a copy somewhere.

Hope you'll get all working.
Vince

maybe this tool will help you if it's necessary to use some
http://www.diskman.co.uk/

Thanks vince, I'll have a look at what you suggest.

There used to be a site that used PAR2 for recovery of old floppies but looks like it's down:

GameRez.ORG is Live.

How can there be a non DOS version of DOOM? No DOS executable is included?

DosFreak wrote:

How can there be a non DOS version of DOOM? No DOS executable is included?

The "CD Collection" most likely refers to the 2001 Doom Collector's Edition which was just Doom95 only.

Yeah it's a doom collectors edition but i will take a closer look as i'd assumed there was no dos executable, didn't actually check.

Several years ago I used VGACOPY with 99 retries for recovering those stubborn floppies. Sometimes it will read data ok after a few retries.

DosFreak wrote:

There used to be a site that used PAR2 for recovery of old floppies but looks like it's down:

GameRez.ORG is Live.

I think that this is the main reason it didn't last.

Shagittarius wrote:

I changed the site so that you needed to be registered to download. I wasn't getting a lot of sign ups, and I'd like to try to have some sort of a user base so you must be registered to download the files now.

It was a great idea. I can see the need for having registration required for uploads, but not downloads.

you could always cheat and find floppy images of that doom 😉

ratfink wrote:

Pulling back the slide shows the surfaces to have minor smudges and a few circular score marks.

I think that while CDs can tolerate that kind of damage to some extent, your floppies are seriously busted.

Furthermore, if it was your floppy drive that caused that kind of damage, you should consider getting a new drive.

Jorpho wrote:

ratfink wrote:

Pulling back the slide shows the surfaces to have minor smudges and a few circular score marks.

I think that while CDs can tolerate that kind of damage to some extent, your floppies are seriously busted.

Furthermore, if it was your floppy drive that caused that kind of damage, you should consider getting a new drive.

It's how the floppies arrived, bought from ebay - I checked the surface condition of one before I used it. Ho hum. Was only a 99p auction at least.

SpinRite has always made miracles for me regarding floppies.

It's not freeware, although you can demand a refund if you're not satisfied with it in the first 30 days.

Regards.