I am getting "General failure reading drive A:" error messages trying to access the floppy disk

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I am getting "General failure reading drive A:" error messages trying to access the floppy disk

Explanation:
While attempting to access the floppy disk, you get a general failure error. The disk may or may not actually be accessed (meaning the activity light may or may not come on) when you try the command.
Diagnosis:
The most common cause of this problem is trying to read an unformatted disk. If a working disk produces this problem, and especially if the drive activity light doesn't come on, this points to a problem with the drive or controller.
Recommendation:

Make sure that you have a disk in the drive that is formatted and working properly. Using an install disk from a software package for testing is a good idea. Try several disks and see if the problem occurs with all of them.
Make sure the floppy drive types are properly set up in the system BIOS.
If the drive activity light comes on before the error is displayed then this implies a problem with the drive or with the disk in the drive at the time.
The disk could be badly corrupted. Troubleshoot corruption here.
Watch for any known-good disks that stop working after a period of time; there could be a virus at work so be sure to scan for viruses on your hard disk and any floppies you use regularly.
If the drive activity light does not come on at all when you try to access the drive and immediately you get a general failure error, this implies strongly that there is a problem with the floppy disk controller. (Usually a failure of the drive would cause the disk to not be recognized at all, producing an "Invalid drive specification" error). Troubleshoot the controller here.
If you can't find any other cause, suspect the floppy disk itself and troubleshoot it in this section.

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