I see. Thanks. The one that can only read 360KB floppies is actually an old drive, while the one that cannot read any floppies at all is a newer one (bought around 1994 or so).

Too bad I can't exactly remember the brand, but IIRC the old one is Teac.

Since the PCs these machines are usually found in are pretty old it wouldn't be surprising if the 5.25 inch drive stopped reading disks due to dust build up as well. It goes without saying that your first line of attack should be to bast the hell out of the non working drive with some canned air.

I just recently lost a 3.5" drive on an old P-90, making me paranoid that the 5.25 may go also.

I have 2 Teac's quad density drives. They are a keeper. I use them on my Acorn BBC's and BBC Master.
Have 4 high density drives too, and I'll be willing to give 2 of them. Postal fees only.

What about 8" floppies?

I think they were out of the picture by the time the original PC came out, and that their capacities were ridiculously small by today's standards.

Really, what were they used in then? That was all before my time.

I used 8" floppies for backups on an Digital LSI-11. We also had a drive in a Data General MV10000, but since that also had an excellent 1/4" tape drive the floppy didn't see much use.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PDP-11#The_LSI-11
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_General#MV_Series

yea, you dont see those tape drives anymore either.