Are floppies dying?

[Sinclair]

Go to a computer-vendor site where you can customise a PC... Frequently a 3.5" floppy drive will be an add-on. USB flash memory and CD/DVD-RWs are replacing floppies, it seems. Please tell me I've percieved this wrongly.

Because it's a shame. Floppies are cheap, and who doesn't have a million of the things sitting around already?

Yeah, 1.44 megs isn't a lot, but it's enough for documents or a few pictures.

USB memory is expensive. Lose one? Ouch. Even the 32meg ones are still 10-20 bucks Canadian, at least, apiece. Lose your 1gig memory stick? How much did that cost?

CD/DVD-RWs are now cheap as hell, but it's quicker to transfer something to a floppy than burn a CD or DVD, still. You can fit a floppy in your pocket better than a CD in a case.

Christ... I remember when you could fit a whole game on a floppy, or a few flopppies. I shouldn't feel this old.

[Felix the Cat]

Still need em for BIOS flashes and other low level stuff

And trust me, if your computer goes fux0r you really need a floppy drive

[Sinclair]

For a boot disk?

[Felix the Cat]

For booting, for loading low-level drivers, for poking around virus-damaged disks...

Drivers are a particular bitch, since a lot of these newer types of storage don't work "straight-from-BIOS" and need to be installed before use

Floppies are just the simplest way of doing the job

[Uberberserker]

Yes floppies do appear to be dying off. One sees them (and their drives) less and less at stores.

I am by no means computer savy, but have been around them for a long time and my first computer was a Commodore 64 in like the 1980s so to me things like the 3.5" disks and CD drives are new. Indeed one of my friends had a Datasette (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Datasette) (that had some good text games on it!) so I can somewhat sympathize with you when it comes to feeling old! That stuff is ancient!

[Excorcism]

I purchased my first usbkey (flash drive) about 3 or 4 years ago. It was 64 megs and I paid about 35 bucks on it. Times sure have changed alot.

[Empress Cheesatine]

This computer is a year and a half old and I have not used the floppy drive ONCE.

I remember having a TRaSh-80 as our first home "computer" which actually was just a cheapo keyboard connected to a black and white tv, with an added 300 baud external modem. A tape recorder was the storage device.

[Anarch]

I remember installing Ultimate Doom off a few floppy disks, a long time ago...

[Billy Score]

talk about a floppy drive, i've got a goddamned Zip drive. I have never once inserted anything into it.

[Excorcism]

talk about a floppy drive, i've got a goddamned Zip drive. I have never once inserted anything into it.

dear god, I purchased a zip drive 3 years ago and a 250 mb disk...and never used it once.

[hellsatan]

Floppy's are useful for booting...

As for transferring files, almost every computer worth using these days has a USB socket for a USB "Pen Drive" or similar device, capable of transporting about 88 times as much as a floppy drive on the smallest capacity one you can buy commercially, which is 128MB...

Of course you can get a 256MB, which is 177 times the storage space, a 512MB, which is 355 times the storage space, a 1GB, which is 711 times the storage space, a 1.5GB, which is 1066 times the storage space, and a 2GB, which is 1422 times the storage space...

And if that isn't enough, you can use one of your portable MP3 player's harddisk space of 20 or 30 or 40 or 50 or 60GB (well whatever isn't being used by your greebo shit :p) to transfer larger files with...

And talking of Floppy's - I remember installing a game about, ooh, 9 or 10 years ago now onto my computer, which used 7 Floppy Disks - That was like "Whoa that's a big game..."

How technology changes...

In 10 years time, DVDs will probably seem to us then like Floppy's do to us now, almost obselete, with new TB of datastorage devices available :)

Chris

[Crowley]

I never used my floppy. When I finally needed it for a reinstall, it was broke. Non-use wore it out.

[Sinclair]

I think 32meg USB Flash memory thingies can still be bought.

It sort of scares me that 4 gig ones are around...

Floppies are great for carrying documents around. USB Flash devices are still too pricey to be expendable, which floppies are.