Fat Tracks

There is some great debate over what a FAT TRACK is. I believe Mike (J. Henry) coined this phrase. It certainly wasn’t me. Electronics Arts was known for this type of protection, which is really nothing more than 3 valid tracks in a row – 34, 34.5, and 35. The half track could be read successfully on the original. You could not write half tracks with the 1541 without turning off the guard band (erase head). If you did that, you could write true half tracks. However, for the EA stuff we either cracked it or just wrote back tracks 34 and 35 so they were in perfect alignment, which basically worked for EA’s simple check.
Jim Drew