I have long advised against formatting 1.4MB disks as 800K. I read they were unreliable in just about every book on Macs and wanted to see for myself.
Way back in 1995, I covered the second hole of a 1.4MB disk with a piece of tape and formatted it as an 800K disk. The disk worked fine for a few days but became extremely error-prone within a week.
Since then, I have always made it a point to purchase 800K disks whenever I need to use the lower capacity (typically only if I'm dealing with 800K drive Macs--still fairly common in 1995 when people were using Pluses/SEs/IIs more frequently). Also, I've stocked up on 800Ks every time I've seen them since Wal Mart quit carrying them several years ago.
A good place to check is a Goodwill ComputerWorks store. I've purchased many 800K disks, brand new in shrinkwrapped boxes, at the Pittsburgh location (on various occasions--even though I do tend to buy all of them whenever I'm by the store).
Way back in 1995, I covered the second hole of a 1.4MB disk with a piece of tape and formatted it as an 800K disk. The disk worked fine for a few days but became extremely error-prone within a week.
Since then, I have always made it a point to purchase 800K disks whenever I need to use the lower capacity (typically only if I'm dealing with 800K drive Macs--still fairly common in 1995 when people were using Pluses/SEs/IIs more frequently). Also, I've stocked up on 800Ks every time I've seen them since Wal Mart quit carrying them several years ago.
A good place to check is a Goodwill ComputerWorks store. I've purchased many 800K disks, brand new in shrinkwrapped boxes, at the Pittsburgh location (on various occasions--even though I do tend to buy all of them whenever I'm by the store).