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Why won't floppy disks just die already?

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None of the conputers at work have a floppy drive, nor does my home PC. I didn't even realize it was missing unitl I had it for a couple of months. :lol
 
MickeyKnox said:
Well if you want to build a rig with an "oh so fast" Sata hd then you will need a boot disc for XP to install to it.
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Wrong, most SATA discs will install without any problems on Windows XP SP1 or higher.
 
I still have floppies from the early '90s when I first got my 386 with all sorts of weird stuff on them. Because I have hundreds of them, I haven't had much inclination to go through them and pull off what I want to keep, but every once in a while, I'll pop a few of them in to look at some old crap. That's about the only reason why I keep a floppy drive on my computer. Believe it or not, some friends and family of mine still use those floppy disk Sony Mavica cameras, so I'll offload pics from those disks to my computer. I'm of the mentality that the moment I get rid of it completely is when I'll need it the most. It's pretty transparent, so having it doesn't bother me in the least.
 
Floppies? Pfft. Zip disks? LOL!

Superdisks are the future!

ls120cy2.jpg
 
Floppy disks are still useful as boot disks, and for apps that need to run at boot, outside of Windows. When my RAM was going bad last year, I had to put the RAM-testing programs on bootable floppies....then run RAM tests.
 
border said:
Floppy disks are still useful as boot disks, and for apps that need to run at boot, outside of Windows. When my RAM was going bad last year, I had to put the RAM-testing programs on bootable floppies....then run RAM tests.
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It's just as easy to make those apps bootable on CDs these days.
 
I've had really uneven experiences with "bootable" burned CDs. Sometimes they work, sometimes they don't. The apps I was working with didn't have any instructions for making boot-CDs, and in terms of "ease" I doubt it's as easy as cut n' pasting onto a floppy.
 
I remember one time I was trying to transfer some music over to another computer and I had to do it through floppies (56k sucks). I think i made like 35 floppies and I think only 3 actually worked.
 
Core407 said:
I remember one time I was trying to transfer some music over to another computer and I had to do it through floppies (56k sucks). I think i made like 35 floppies and I think only 3 actually worked.
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It was always fun to install one of those games that came on like 35 floppies only to realize the first disc was bad.
 
TemplaerDude said:
Instead of spending 14$ on defunct hardware, you could have instead bought yourself some candy, a pop, and rented a movie. Much more enjoyable.
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The candy and pop would have been gone by now, and I would've watched the movie once.

The $10 spent on the drive has lasted 3+ years! Hurrah! I got it at compusa, it was a really old floppy drive that they fixed somehow, and put in a new shell. It's one noisy piece of crap. But it's fast (for a floppy drive) and gets the job done when I need it like, two times a year.

I'll always use new technology over a floppy drive, but it doesn't hurt to have one. YEESH.
 
i love my flash drive. It's only 512MB, but it's enough to hold my favorite apps (<3 www.portableapps.com), my resume and portfolio pieces, and a few random vids/music/pics/docs. i love being able to jack it in, open up Firefox, download a couple of torrents, and save the files to my computer. i usually end up uploading my files to my host as an alternative to my flash drive. i think uploading files to a remote server, whether your own, or a webmail account, is just as useful as the flash drive itself. i nervously uploaded 2GB of shots from my cousin's graduation to my host, formatted my cards, and downloaded them when i got home. Awesome.

tedtropy said:
It was always fun to install one of those games that came on like 35 floppies only to realize the first disc was bad.
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Or the fifth (RIP Wing Commander II). Or to back up your computer on 60 floppies, then one of them has an error. i did that once, then learned to make more frequent backups. And to NEVER use floppies again. Same with Zip disks. i lost a disk full of hand-downloaded hentai (laugh at me) that i got over a 56k connection. One day it's there, the next it isn't. No click of death or anything. That should've been a warning, but i continued to use them at school. Ended up with a project that was nearly lost because of the click of death. After that i burnt CDs, and uploaded files to my Yahoo! Briefcase.
 
Kung Fu Jedi said:
Nope. Many drivers come on CD now. Hell, don't remember the last time I got them on a floppy, and I usually go to the web to find the latest drivers that aren't on either a floppy or a CD.
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ERM you realize that when you're installing Windows XP, you can't switch CDs right? You can only load 3rd party drivers off a floppy disk or usb key (and the usb key is only IF your motherboard supports it)

The drivers come on the CD, but usually you have to boot to the CD and run a utility that copies the drivers to a floppy disk. I'm assuming you're refering to the CD that comes with the motherboard/computer, not the Win XP install disc (which has no way of telling what kind of SATA or SCSI hardware you have)
 
The Shadow said:
Negative.

It's entirely dependent on the motherboard chipset.
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I have a Silicon Image 3x12 (A7N8X Deluxe). I hear it's pretty easy to slipstream but I just said **** it.

Also, I'm using the latest firmware (or one that's recent enough) thanks to a hacked UBER BIOS, lolz.
 
Core407 said:
I remember one time I was trying to transfer some music over to another computer and I had to do it through floppies (56k sucks). I think i made like 35 floppies and I think only 3 actually worked.
Click to expand...

:lol

God, I would have been scared to attempt that. Another easy way to transfer shit is get a crossover cable and connect to the two PCs together (if their close) and physically connect the two PCs (or laptop to laptop, laptop to PC) together.
 
UPS doesn't purchase PCs with floppies anymore....

Now that kinda pisses me off when Im upgrading older hardware that uses floppies and I can't use my PC to transfer the data onto the floppy. :lol
 
tape drives! or backups that spanned across multiple tapes. apparently they have like a 40% failure rate :lol or did i make that up?
 
The last time I reinstalled WinXP (without SP1 or SP2 slipstreamed in) on my system with an NF7-Sv2 motherboard I was able to just insert the included CD at the right time and it installed the drivers fine. No issues, so far as I can remember.
 
SonnyBoy said:
UPS doesn't purchase PCs with floppies anymore....

Now that kinda pisses me off when Im upgrading older hardware that uses floppies and I can't use my PC to transfer the data onto the floppy. :lol
Click to expand...

You can get USB floppy drives for like $20, should you really need one.
 
I consider floppies to be the last failsafe, so I still purchase PC's and laptops for the company I work for with floppy drives... the cost in minimal in terms of the volume purchasing we do, so why not... and if there's even an instance where we need it, its there.
 
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