the floppy

BBC News - 40 ways we still use floppy disks

i cant believe they are still in use, i wonder what will happen when they run out because sony made the last box a year ago and they were the last manufactures

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TheShadow

demonfurbie wrote: »

BBC News - 40 ways we still use floppy disks

i cant believe they are still in use, i wonder what will happen when they run out because sony made the last box a year ago and they were the last manufactures

Common misconception; Sony was the last maker of the physical drive and stopped making them. The media is still made by several vendors including biggies like Verbatim and Imation and maybe Sony unless that is a causality of the disaster. As long as people still buy it there will always be media manfacturing. 9 track tape anyone?

Devilsbane

Somebody will always make them, it might just be an unknown company.

I picked up a stack a couple years ago free from college. I was intending to go through them with a hex editor but never found the time.

elphrank0

We have scopes here that only work with Floppy's!

Webmaster

I still have hundreds in boxes and bags a few feet away from me. I plan to copy the 3.5" that are still readable to a CD some day.

Here's a fresh pic of a "more recent" floppy, I should have some Windows 2.1 floppies hidden somewhere although those are on 5.25" and I haven't kept a reading device for those.

Also found Windows 95 disk 23-25, not sure where the rest is

msdos622.jpg

demonfurbie

Webmaster wrote: »

I still have hundreds in boxes and bags a few feet away from me. I plan to copy the 3.5" that are still readable to a CD some day.

Here's a fresh pic of a "more recent" floppy, I should have some Windows 2.1 floppies hidden somewhere although those are on 5.25" and I haven't kept a reading device for those.

Also found Windows 95 disk 23-25, not sure where the rest is

ive got pc dos on disk some were as well ... it has the old ibm logo on it

mikedisd2

We were using floppies only a few years ago when building IBM x series servers to upgrade firmware. It was simple and they were rewritable so I could keep using the same set.

Don't know about floppies now but the USB FDD's are damned expensive ($80).

MentholMoose

mikedisd2 wrote: »

Don't know about floppies now but the USB FDD's are damned expensive ($80).

Check eBay, new ones are available for <$20. I use one manufactured by Teac since it works under Windows XP/2003 setup (others brands I've used aren't detected), e.g. for adding drivers or an answer file.

Devilsbane

MentholMoose wrote: »

Check eBay, new ones are available for <$20. I use one manufactured by Teac since it works under Windows XP/2003 setup (others brands I've used aren't detected), e.g. for adding drivers or an answer file.

Thats where I bought mine. Something like $15 and it works like a charm.

Kasor

You got my attention on this topic. I have a MS-DOS 6.0 floppy at my collection : )

Cpl.Klinger

We still use them at work, only once a year. When we do our yearly store inventory, the counts for the items (approx. 25-27,000 different SKU's) is loaded to a floppy that gets uploaded to the system to "update" the counts. We then spend the next few weeks fixing them.

qwertyiop

I still have all my original Windows 3.11 disks, unfortunalty not in its original packing but they still work

jibbajabba

At least a lot of manufacturer of raid cards for example,, implemented firmware updates through Windows or Linux. The only time when we need floppies are bios updates, IPMI resets (management cards) etc. But most motherboards can boot from USB and you can easily create a bootable DOS USB stick which has all the tools on it ... Or CDs but you'd have to recreate them obviously when you need to update some files.