Steve Gibson's "spinrite" got me fired! -- true story!

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dt041054

This happened in Rockville, Maryland.

As a service tech in the MFM/RLL days, I was called to
an old people's community organization. Their disk
needed a low-level format. The nice old lady said
"Thank GOD you're here!", begged me to fix her
computer, and told me of all the sad, terrible things
that would happen to the old people if the data were
lost.

Being new, I was accompanied by the other tech from
this outfit. He was happy I recognized that the
drive needed a low-level.

I got out my trusty personal copy of Steve Gibson's
Spinrite II. The other tech had never heard of nondestructive
low-level formatting.

"See, this reads the track before reformatting it.
Then when it formats the track, instead of writing
zeroes as sector data, it uses the original data, so
they don't loose any. Isn't that COOL!" I said, wide-eyed
and innocent.

"...But won't that take twice as long?"

I looked at the old lady wringing her hands hopefully
on the other side of the room. She couldn't hear us.

"It will take 20 minutes instead of 10. But we'll
save their data". I assumed it was a no-brainer.

"No!" he said. "This is a service contract". "So
what?", I asked. "So we already HAVE their money!
Just format their drive and we can BILL that 10
minutes at the next job. We're not a charity
organization"!

I felt like it was suddenly the twilight zone, literally.
I thought about what to say. I knew this would be
a turning point in my life, when I would either
become something, or become the opposite, forever.

I thought about my professors at the University of
Maryland, and how much I missed them. I thought
about Dr. Basili.

"No... I can't do that" I said, and continued the
format. It took 22 minutes.

After rebooting, the system was back up and the old
lady was ecstatic. "What is your name, young man?",
she asked". "David". "God bless you, David!", she
said.

We almost got into a fistfight over it in the parking
lot, but agreed to take it to the company president.

He agreed with the other tech... and fired me. There
was no other reason, just this. As I left, the other
tech smiled smugly.

====

Knowledge is not power.
And the truth doesn't make you free.

But to this day, for me, hearing the word "spinrite"
gives me a feeling of... integrity.

Thank you, Steve.

Thank you, Dr. Basili.

--[ dave
 
Your partner should have stopped you... never do _anything_ before you
backup all the data.
 
As a service tech in the MFM/RLL days, I was called to
an old people's community organization. Their disk
needed a low-level format.
Click to expand...
Being new, I was accompanied by the other tech
Click to expand...
I got out my trusty personal copy of Steve Gibson's
Spinrite II. The other tech had never heard of nondestructive
low-level formatting.
Click to expand...
"...But won't that take twice as long?"

I looked at the old lady wringing her hands hopefully
on the other side of the room. She couldn't hear us.

"It will take 20 minutes instead of 10. But we'll
save their data". I assumed it was a no-brainer.

"No!" he said. "This is a service contract". "So
what?", I asked. "So we already HAVE their money!
Just format their drive and we can BILL that 10
minutes at the next job. We're not a charity
organization"!
Click to expand...
After rebooting, the system was back up and the old
lady was ecstatic.
Click to expand...
We almost got into a fistfight over it in the parking
lot, but agreed to take it to the company president.

He agreed with the other tech... and fired me. There
was no other reason, just this. As I left, the other
tech smiled smugly.
Click to expand...

Was there any other way to back up the data? I remember some drives
being so marginal that they couldn't be read by any of the backup
programs I had, and Spinrite was the only practical way to recover all
the data. But I also carried a "huge" 80M Seagate and regularly ran a
sector scan utility that would complain if a track took more than 2
tries (that's anywhere from 2-16 revolutions) to read.
 
Was there any other way to back up the data?
Click to expand...

Yep, do the backup BEFORE the drive goes bad.
I remember some drives being so marginal that they
couldn't be read by any of the backup programs I had,
and Spinrite was the only practical way to recover all the data.
Click to expand...

Sure, but its obviously better to back it up before the drive gets that bad.
 
Was there any other way to back up the data?
Click to expand...

This 'anecdote' is not about backup at all.
I remember some drives being so marginal that they couldn't be read
by any of the backup programs I had,
Click to expand...

If SpinRite can read it, so can any other program that ignores bad sectors
as an error condition but whether that is practical is a rather different
matter. Either you read each and every bad sector (successfully) or your
backup is not a backup in the true meaning of the word.

The Spinrite approach means that what can be read is refreshed and
what cannot is still in it's original state, which can't be said if the drive
is reformatted and an incomplete backup is restored to it, the unread
data is gone forever and you don't even know what files are affected.
and Spinrite was the only practical way to recover all the data.
Click to expand...

Or at least the most efficient.
 
Your partner should have stopped you... never do _anything_ before you
backup all the data.
Click to expand...

Right. I think the boss would have been very happy if they took the
opportunity to sell the client a backup system & corresponding
additional maintenance contract & media for it, then used spinrite to
correct the problem instead of sitting around for a backup, format,
and restore to complete. Cha ching!
 
We almost got into a fistfight over it in the parking
lot, but agreed to take it to the company president.

He agreed with the other tech... and fired me. There
was no other reason, just this. As I left, the other
tech smiled smugly.
Click to expand...

Well, you learned a valuable lesson - that there's a lot of people out
there who are basically shit. Good for you that you're not one of
them.

The bad news is that the shits of the world are often the most
successful, because they are willing to ****-over others to get-ahead.
You don't want to work for a POS, though.
 
Previously chrisv said:
(e-mail address removed) wrote:
Click to expand...
Well, you learned a valuable lesson - that there's a lot of people out
there who are basically shit. Good for you that you're not one of
them.
Agreed.

The bad news is that the shits of the world are often the most
successful, because they are willing to ****-over others to get-ahead.
You don't want to work for a POS, though.
Click to expand...

Agreed again. One of the fundamental flaws with unfetered capitalism.
Only competent customers have a chance there....

Arno
 
This happened in Rockville, Maryland.

As a service tech in the MFM/RLL days, I was called to
an old people's community organization. Their disk
needed a low-level format. The nice old lady said
"Thank GOD you're here!", begged me to fix her
computer, and told me of all the sad, terrible things
that would happen to the old people if the data were
lost.

Being new, I was accompanied by the other tech from
this outfit. He was happy I recognized that the
drive needed a low-level.
Click to expand...

What determines when a drive needs a low level format??

I got out my trusty personal copy of Steve Gibson's
Spinrite II. The other tech had never heard of nondestructive
low-level formatting.

"See, this reads the track before reformatting it.
Then when it formats the track, instead of writing
zeroes as sector data, it uses the original data, so
they don't loose any. Isn't that COOL!" I said, wide-eyed
and innocent.

"...But won't that take twice as long?"

I looked at the old lady wringing her hands hopefully
on the other side of the room. She couldn't hear us.

"It will take 20 minutes instead of 10. But we'll
save their data". I assumed it was a no-brainer.

"No!" he said. "This is a service contract". "So
what?", I asked. "So we already HAVE their money!
Just format their drive and we can BILL that 10
minutes at the next job. We're not a charity
organization"!

I felt like it was suddenly the twilight zone, literally.
I thought about what to say. I knew this would be
a turning point in my life, when I would either
become something, or become the opposite, forever.

I thought about my professors at the University of
Maryland, and how much I missed them. I thought
about Dr. Basili.

"No... I can't do that" I said, and continued the
format. It took 22 minutes.

After rebooting, the system was back up and the old
lady was ecstatic. "What is your name, young man?",
she asked". "David". "God bless you, David!", she
said.

We almost got into a fistfight over it in the parking
lot, but agreed to take it to the company president.

He agreed with the other tech... and fired me. There
was no other reason, just this. As I left, the other
tech smiled smugly.

====

Knowledge is not power.
And the truth doesn't make you free.

But to this day, for me, hearing the word "spinrite"
gives me a feeling of... integrity.

Thank you, Steve.

Thank you, Dr. Basili.

--[ dave
Click to expand...
 
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