From: dave.g4ugm@gmail.com   
      
   "Ken Springer"  wrote in message   
   news:j5imj1$6dj$1@dont-email.me...   
   > Maybe someone from Atariland knows or knows where the information is,   
   > since we could read IBM/PC floppies...   
   >   
   > When the 3.5 floppy first appeared, in the PC world, if you had the right   
   > drive and the computer's BIOS supported it, you could format a floppy to 3   
   > densities, 720k, 1.2mb, and 1.44mb.   
   >   
   > You also had disks formatted by Windows95 and after, plus some disks that   
   > were IBM formatted.   
   >   
   > I'm trying to find out the difference between the Windows format and the   
   > IBM format.   
      
   The only thing I can think of is long file name support. Windows floppies   
   can have long file names as well as short ones ....   
      
   >   
   > Why?  I need to upgrade the BIOS on an old Gateway computer, and the   
   > instructions specify the floppy used *must* be an IBM formatted floppy. If   
   > you use a Windows formatted floppy, the update will fail.   
   >   
      
   Apart from long file names the only other thing I can think of is that a   
   Windows/2000, XP or later disk isn't normally bootable, but it there is an   
   option to create a DOS boot disk in Explorer.   
      
   > Anyone know/remember the difference?   
   >   
   > So far, asking the right questions in the right places in the PC world,   
   > and Googling and Ask.com, have not come up with the answer.  :-(   
   >   
      
   I think that's because the question doesn't make sense.  Almost all "PC" and   
   "ST" floppies are formatted FAT 16   
      
   >   
   > --   
   > Ken   
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   Dave   
      
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