Will Floppies ever die

calpha

Golden Member
Mar 7, 2001
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When????????????????

I'm sick of em. If it weren't for Win2k installs, I would trash all of them

 

keystroker

Senior member
May 19, 2001
653
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bootup cd. um anyways you find it kinda weird how movies used to use floppies for data saving, then cd-rom, now smaller and smaller microchips.
 

PsychoAndy

Lifer
Dec 31, 2000
10,735
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HELL NO!!!!!

Every die hard nerd still has about 1000 formatted (with labels removed of course) aol 3.0 install disks in his garage or desk.....used for whatever....win2k boot disks, coasters, stuff to throw at the UPS guy, et al.
 

wildwildwes

Senior member
Jul 18, 2001
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I thought I was rid of them for good until my programming classes started asking for copies on floppy disks.

I hate those damn things!
 

Swag1138

Diamond Member
Feb 7, 2000
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<< HELL NO!!!!!

Every die hard nerd still has about 1000 formatted (with labels removed of course) aol 3.0 install disks in his garage or desk.....used for whatever....win2k boot disks, coasters, stuff to throw at the UPS guy, et al.
>>



I actually finally got rid of all my AOL disks. And wouldnt ya know it, I need em now that Im in school.

Oh well.
 

calpha

Golden Member
Mar 7, 2001
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<< why would you need a floppy for win2k installs? >>



For hardware not detected by W2k like RAID Cards, SCSI Cards, etc.
 

calpha

Golden Member
Mar 7, 2001
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<< What else would I use for drive diagnostics software? >>



A bootable CD. And yes you can make them, but it's a PITA.
 

calpha

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Mar 7, 2001
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I remember before my former employer had a Cd-Burner in the late 90s. Went all the way to a damn installation site (3 hours away) to do a friggin install/upgrade using Installshield on my 7 floppies.

Floppy 7 had developed a Bad Sector and would not read, and I didn't have and FixDisk utilities. Had to go all the way back and create the SOB installation set again, test again 5 times, put floppies in a kryptonite heat free case, and try again. This time wouldn't read floppy 2 (but I had a Fix Disc). Turns out the Floppies we were using SUUUUUCKed, and that was the problem.

Next week, they got a Burner. :)

I HATE FLOPPIES.

Thank God my mom finally got a burner for her computer. She's working all kinds of hours studying for a teacher's national board and doing the pre-req work (4 document submissions). She was backing everything up to Floppy, and I was scared as crap for her. Now, she backs up to CD :)
 

ThisIsMatt

Banned
Aug 4, 2000
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I wish zip 100 had been more widely adopted and phased out floppies...would have been a significant improvement...
 

calpha

Golden Member
Mar 7, 2001
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<< I wish zip 100 had been more widely adopted and phased out floppies...would have been a significant improvement... >>



Ah christ. Thanks for the reminder of my IOM stock tanking mess. I too loved Zips, but the CD-Rs killed them. Besides, IOM hasn't been able to get off their ass and innovate anything "Great" since the ZIP Disk. You can argue one or two of their products were maybe "good" but the price point was outrageous.

<---- Owner of a Zip 100, Zip 250, and a <Gasp, ACK, Cough, Cna't believe I'm admitting this> Jaz 2GB Drive

Also still wondering why SuperDisks never took hold. Oh yah. FLOPPIES SUCK.
 

ChinamanatNCSU

Golden Member
Nov 15, 2001
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OT, sorry :eek:

but calpha- tell your mom gl. I had a couple teachers in hs go up for that thing- bunches of work, but I respected them all the more afterwards
 

calpha

Golden Member
Mar 7, 2001
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<< OT, sorry :eek:

but calpha- tell your mom gl. I had a couple teachers in hs go up for that thing- bunches of work, but I respected them all the more afterwards
>>



I will and continue to do so. Thanks. She's said a number of times that she's thought about buying out her contract since the state is paying for it and quitting ($2000) because it's such a stressful thing to do. She's even known of teachers who submit thier 4 documents, and then when they get to the test, get up and leave (and fork over the $2000) because the test is so hard, nad outrageous.

i'm really proud of her so far. She's been working really hard on it, and I'm trying to think of somtheing to get her when and if she finishes.
 

tcsenter

Lifer
Sep 7, 2001
18,873
519
126
I would get rid of mine if 100 million other people didn't still have them. That's sort of the problem with ditching a floppy, you never know who is going to pass you something on diskette.

I really don't understand how the heck a 15 year old floppy drive is still with us. The LS-120 was a flop, the Zip was great for a while but everyone used it in addition to the floppy, not a replacement. Both were too expensive to replace the floppy ($100+ vs. $20), which is the main reason neither ultimately unseated the floppy drive.

It seems to me that, instead of leaping from 1.44MB to 100MB (or 120MB in the case of the LS-120), it would have made MUCH more sense to develop a drive that was around 6MB or 8MB, which could have sold for not much more than a floppy drive. Dumb.

Speaking of dumb industry decisions, could anyone tell why Intel/Microsoft/et. al. decided as part of its PC97 and ATX specifications to move the mouse from a legacy IRQ (serial IRQ4) to a true PCI IRQ (PS/2 IRQ12) when PCI IRQ's are in such short supply? Dumb. I'm tired of being one IRQ short for all my PCI devices, so I just get a PS/2>DB9 adapter and put my mouse on COM1.
 

ThisIsMatt

Banned
Aug 4, 2000
11,820
1
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<<

<< I wish zip 100 had been more widely adopted and phased out floppies...would have been a significant improvement... >>



Ah christ. Thanks for the reminder of my IOM stock tanking mess. I too loved Zips, but the CD-Rs killed them. Besides, IOM hasn't been able to get off their ass and innovate anything "Great" since the ZIP Disk. You can argue one or two of their products were maybe "good" but the price point was outrageous.

<---- Owner of a Zip 100, Zip 250, and a <Gasp, ACK, Cough, Cna't believe I'm admitting this> Jaz 2GB Drive

Also still wondering why SuperDisks never took hold. Oh yah. FLOPPIES SUCK.
>>

I have an internal, my bro has an internal, and I also have an external USB, plus about 20 or so 100MB disks. They're great for dumping stuff relatively quick or transferring stuff that's only about that size. I think the 250MB version was a stupid idea, frankly, especially when the 250 drives I've used were slower on a 100MB disk than a normal 100 drive...

I never tried a jaz drive, what's wrong with it?
 

calpha

Golden Member
Mar 7, 2001
1,287
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<<

<<

<< I wish zip 100 had been more widely adopted and phased out floppies...would have been a significant improvement... >>



Ah christ. Thanks for the reminder of my IOM stock tanking mess. I too loved Zips, but the CD-Rs killed them. Besides, IOM hasn't been able to get off their ass and innovate anything "Great" since the ZIP Disk. You can argue one or two of their products were maybe "good" but the price point was outrageous.

<---- Owner of a Zip 100, Zip 250, and a <Gasp, ACK, Cough, Cna't believe I'm admitting this> Jaz 2GB Drive

Also still wondering why SuperDisks never took hold. Oh yah. FLOPPIES SUCK.
>>

I have an internal, my bro has an internal, and I also have an external USB, plus about 20 or so 100MB disks. They're great for dumping stuff relatively quick or transferring stuff that's only about that size. I think the 250MB version was a stupid idea, frankly, especially when the 250 drives I've used were slower on a 100MB disk than a normal 100 drive...

I never tried a jaz drive, what's wrong with it?
>>



Nothing is "Wrong" with the Jaz Drive it works fine.

1 Jaz Drive : $300
1 3pk 2GB Jaz Disk Pack : $300

You can do the same thing with multiple CD-RS for MUCH MUCH LESS. Plus, no one uses JAZ, so for me, it's just another expensive storage medium. I can't give anyone a JAZ Disk and say here (believe me it would be nice to do that).
 

calpha

Golden Member
Mar 7, 2001
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I still dont' think it would work even if IOMEGA was an "Open Standard".

And the other reason it wouldn't work is that you'd still have to have one ZIP disk for every driver that you wanted to install on W2K, or XP (txtsetup.oem).

Plus, cost is another reason. The SuperDisk was a good idea, but nobody has them either. I think they were an open standard cuz I thought there was more than one manu. of the SuperDisk Drive.

I think the moral of the story is that Floppies will never die on WinDOZE unless MSFT provides some other way to install 3rd party drivers. That, IMO is what it all comes down to.

Maybe we'll get a better floppy one day, but I doubt that too. Remember the short-lived Double Density (2.88) drives?

Well, at least we're not using 1.2 5.25 disks anymore. Man those things were flaky as crap. I can't tell you how many of those went bad on me. Mostly from accidental bends
 

duhh

Senior member
Jul 23, 2001
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i recall reading on hardocp a few months back that chipset vendors are gonna phase out floppy support this year.
 

calpha

Golden Member
Mar 7, 2001
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<< i recall reading on hardocp a few months back that chipset vendors are gonna phase out floppy support this year. >>



Thank God.
 

Thrillhou

Senior member
Jul 24, 2001
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I still enjoy it when people differentiate between the 3.5" and the 5.25" by saying hard disk for the 3.5" and floppy disk for the 5.25"
 

kamiam

Banned
Dec 12, 1999
2,638
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<< I still enjoy it when people differentiate between the 3.5" and the 5.25" by saying hard disk for the 3.5" and floppy disk for the 5.25" >>

hehehe...just watched "wargames" on TV...he was using the 5.25"s AND the cradle phone/modem interface...now thats old

edit: remember playing a game called lunar lander over one of those back in the mid 70's...no video, just data back on positioning, rate of decent ...you played it in a dot matrix printer/typing/input terminal