EASY ALIGNMENT TEST

If a drive doesn't find the load/read data on its first attempt, it automatically searches to the sides of where the data should be. Thus, a drive can be out of alignment and still load/read, but it might create saves/writes that can't be loaded/read by other drives.

So, an easy way to check a drive's alignment is to command it to search once and only once for the data. On a 1541, turn the drive off and on, then type

OPEN15,8,15,"M-W"+CHR$(106)+CHR$(0)+CHR$(1)+CHR$(193):CLOSE 15
Then press [RETURN].

Insert a commercial disk, type LOAD"$",8 and press [[RETURN]. If the directory loads and the error light is not flashing, the alignment is good.

(From Civic 64/128 (Oxnard CA) Gazette, November 1995)