PC World says farewell to floppy (BBC)

eppur_se_muova

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Tue Jan-30-07 12:35 PM
Original message

PC World says farewell to floppy (BBC)

The time has come to bid farewell to one of the PC's more stalwart friends - the floppy disk.

Computing superstore PC World said it will no longer sell the storage devices, affectionately known as floppies, once existing stock runs out.

New storage systems, coupled with a need to store more than the 1.44 megabytes of data held by a standard floppy, have led to its demise.

Only a tiny percentage of PCs currently sold still have floppy disk drives.

"The floppy disk looks increasingly quaint and simply isn't able to compete," said Bryan Magrath, commercial director of PC World.
***
more: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6314251.stm

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tridim

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Tue Jan-30-07 12:41 PM
Response to Original message

1. I don't think I've used a floppy in about 5 years

Data storage on CD's is just about obsolete as well.

When do we get our holographic drives?

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originalpckelly

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Tue Jan-30-07 12:44 PM
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2. Actually, there really are holographic DVD-like disks in the works:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holographic_Versatile_Disc

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Renew Deal

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Tue Jan-30-07 12:50 PM
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3. The floppy is still useful in maintenance and repair situations.

Other than that, not so much.

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Sgent

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Tue Jan-30-07 12:50 PM
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4. There is still some need

for them since raid/special hard drive drivers cannot be loaded for a Windows installation without a floppy -- although this isn't an issue for most home users.

However, I think Vista fixes this relatively rare problem.

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alfredo

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Tue Jan-30-07 12:56 PM
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5. took them long enough. I used my last one when

I bought a Mac G4 back in 2000. My 7100 had a floppy. They were such a hassle. The paper labels would get stuck. The paperclip became essential for manually removing stuck floppies.

I remember it took seven floppies to install HyperCard. What a hassle.

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lpbk2713

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Tue Jan-30-07 12:58 PM
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6. Floppies are an inexpensive way to *give* small files to someone.

And I use *give* in the physical and non-virtual-world sense as opposed to E-Mailing the same small files to someone. Also good for storing small sensitive files that you don't want to store on your HDD if you don't trust or don't want to bother with encryption, like passwords and account info. Of course then you have to keep the floppy in a secure place.

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meldroc

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Wed Jan-31-07 04:04 PM
Response to Reply #6

10. These days I'll burn CDs or use a USB flash drive.

Edited on Wed Jan-31-07 04:06 PM by meldroc

The nerdstick is always on my keychain, very handy, and holds more than 1,000 times the data a floppy could. It's a great place for sensitive data, since you can keep it on your person very easily.

CD-Rs are dirt cheap, especially when you buy spools of 50.

Nearly all modern computers can handle nerdsticks and burn CDs.

I haven't used a floppy in years, except for the occasional technical issue like installing XP on a system that requires a RAID driver, or flashing a BIOS. And then, I frequently end up cursing like a sailor - floppies are incredibly unreliable. Breathe on them wrong and they'll mangle your data.

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libnnc

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Tue Jan-30-07 12:59 PM
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7. I miss my floppy. Served me well.

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Lisa

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Tue Jan-30-07 07:20 PM
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8. I'm saving my G3 Powerbook ...

It can read (and transfer files between) floppies, CDs, and memory sticks. My dad jumped from a Mac Plus to one of the new iMacs and not even a USB external floppy drive will allow him to read his old floppies now ...

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eppur_se_muova

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Wed Jan-31-07 03:42 PM
Response to Reply #8

9. That's a little surprising ... maybe the new drives don't check for 770K floppies?

I would think they would read 1.4 M floppies just fine.

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Lisa

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Wed Jan-31-07 07:43 PM
Response to Reply #9

11. I guess not ...

My antiquated system has no problems with the double-density type, but he's becoming increasingly agitated because he can't read all his old files. (For once, I'm lagging behind him, as far as the technology goes.) I figure there's got to be a way to do this, only it's hard to troubleshoot when he's 3 time zones away. Just talking him through where to look for the USB port took the better part of 20 minutes, and he said he had to go lie down afterwards ... so until I actually get over there, this is the next best solution.

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