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Hardware Dilemma


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#1 misty

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Posted 28 April 2015 - 05:56 PM

I do not work in IT - I do work for a local government with a dedicated IT department that supports over 10,000 employees.

I recently asked a client at work for some information. Today she informed me that she couldn't find it - or at least the hard copy that had been requested. This client is someone I would class as IT illiterate and as far as I am aware has never owned a PC.

Imagine my surprise when she informed me that she had the required information 'on a disk' - imagine the look on my face when she pulled a 3.5" floppy disk out of her handbag!!! I had to apologise for laughing when she gave it to me, and then explain why I'd laughed. I showed her a USB thumb drive I had with me and explained that it was able to hold over 5000 times more information than the significantly larger Floppy she had given me - she looked genuinely shocked.

Now what the bloody hell do I do with it?

I approached our IT department - the support desk is upstairs so I wandered up for a face-to-face due to my unusual request. When I explained the situation they all laughed at me. We don't have any hardware in the entire department capable of reading a floppy disk!

I can't believe that the death of the floppy passed me by so unnoticed. Or that such a widely used and commonly available device has disapeared in the relatively short time (approximately 14 years) I have owned a PC.

God I feel old.

Back to what to do with it. I have an old drive in my attic somewhere. I don't have a computer I can actually connect it to anymore though. Yes I know that external USB floppy disk drives are available - I refuse to buy one!
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#2 erwan.l

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Posted 28 April 2015 - 06:05 PM

Funny you mention that, see below a picture taken these last days by some IT colleagues for fun : a USB floppy drive plugged to some android phone : totally useless but fun.

 

Yes, floppy disks are dead for good!

You could not even store one picture or (ms...) word document these days.

 

7YjEPDH.png


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#3 v77

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Posted 28 April 2015 - 06:12 PM

Yes I know that external USB floppy disk drives are available - I refuse to buy one!

 

You do well. I bought one, and this shit is unable to read all the 720K floppy disks. :angry:
So be careful if you change your mind.



#4 Wonko the Sane

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Posted 29 April 2015 - 05:47 PM

As a side note, the best obituary/tribute was IMHO:
http://news.bbc.co.u.../uk/2905953.stm
 

A:las poor floppy, I knew you well.


and of course ;):

Please insert another disk. This tribute has run out of spa....


I approached our IT department - the support desk is upstairs so I wandered up for a face-to-face due to my unusual request. When I explained the situation they all laughed at me. We don't have any hardware in the entire department capable of reading a floppy disk!

What did you expect from the IT department? That they would actually come out with a solution to a practical issue? :w00t:
It would be a world first when it happens. :ph34r:

@v77
Same here (not that it helps, but you are not alone), it seems like these "slimline" USB floppies only work for 1.44Mb media.
I have a couple of old machines with a floppy drive, anyway, so that is not really an issue for me, except that I have to dig one of them out, connect all the cables, etc., etc.

JFYI:
http://www.kryoflux....age=kf_features
but you won't like the price tag :(.

:duff:
Wonko
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#5 Brito

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Posted 30 April 2015 - 02:21 PM

Things changed on a quick pace. It is already difficult to find a laptop still equipped with a CD/DVD drive.



#6 misty

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Posted 30 April 2015 - 02:24 PM

What did you expect from the IT department? That they would actually come out with a solution to a practical issue?

I work for a local government. We are literally years behind in regards to our hardware - so for this reason alone I did naively expect a solution.

P.s. I enjoyed the obituary/tribute. Not so sure it's accurate - it mentioned the end of the floppy in 2003 - although to be fair it was on April Fools Day!!! I built my first PC around 2003 - at the time I wouldn't have been able to install Windows without a Floppy Disk Drive - I seem to remember having to use four bloody Floppy Disks to start the Windows 2000 installation process from the CD. Once Windows was installed I was able to master a bootable Windows 2000 CD to avoid this tedious issue in the future. At the time one PC was a luxury (at least it was for me) - hence needing the floppy first in order to be able to boot windows so that I then had the environment required for mastering the CD.

#7 misty

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Posted 30 April 2015 - 02:30 PM

Things changed on a quick pace. It is already difficult to find a laptop still equipped with a CD/DVD drive.

My first laptop (and coincidently the first and only computer device I have ever purchased new) was a netbook without a CD/DVD drive - circa 2008. This prompted the need to learn about network booting so it wasn't a bad thing. And if I'm honest I bloody hate optical drives - they're so noisy. Having said that CD/DVD's have been a reliable boot media for years now - USB boot support being something of a dark art on older hardware.

#8 Wonko the Sane

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Posted 30 April 2015 - 05:03 PM

P.s. I enjoyed the obituary/tribute. Not so sure it's accurate - it mentioned the end of the floppy in 2003 - although to be fair it was on April Fools Day!!! I built my first PC around 2003 - at the time I wouldn't have been able to install Windows without a Floppy Disk Drive - I seem to remember having to use four bloody Floppy Disks to start the Windows 2000 installation process from the CD. Once Windows was installed I was able to master a bootable Windows 2000 CD to avoid this tedious issue in the future. At the time one PC was a luxury (at least it was for me) - hence needing the floppy first in order to be able to boot windows so that I then had the environment required for mastering the CD.

Well, it is around that date, anyway.

I bought a very expensive laptop (extra-portable) in 2001 and it was the first thingy I ever saw without a floppy (exception made lots of time before for a Next cube :w00t: and for a few Mac's).
Machines, I mean "normal" desktops assembled in 2003 still mostly sported it AFAICR, but beginning 2004 it started becoming an option.
DELL removed it beginning 2003:
http://www.pcmag.com...7,905379,00.asp
http://www.techvibes...-great-30-years

We could say that the agony of the poor little thing lasted all 2003 and 2004, but after that it was definitely an endangered species.

What is - if not surprising at least interesting - that for several years there was no suitable replacement for it and till today the mess of issues the industry (both hardware and software) made with USB sticks and SD cards (more or less the same mess they have managed to make earlier with CF cards and later with CDRW and with the folly that is/was the set of various DVD writable formats) is far from being fully solved.

:duff:
Wonko

#9 erwan.l

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Posted 30 April 2015 - 05:12 PM

There were a few attempts in the 90's to replace the floppy but they all failed.

I myself tried the LS120, the zip drive, the syquest, .... but utlimately I think the cdrw/dvdrw killed them all.

 

One media has to be cheap, fast, reliable, easy to use : not that easy to meet all these criterias.

 

But these days, who stores datas anyway? It is all in the cloud :) (yeah right...)



#10 Blackcrack

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Posted 01 May 2015 - 05:19 AM

oohhh misty, betause this reason i loove you *bg*

i have the same Floppy like Ervan, because exactly this reason, you sould look for some usb-foppy,

because, maby comes some customer again ! *lol* oohhh how shocked ! *rofl* really funny situation !*lol*

no, in serious, look for an usb-floppy, it's ever well for have some tool to have something up their sleeve ;)

Also maby in 10 years.. something it's ever well to have .. :)

 

for harddisk's , http://www.digitus.i...ble-da-70148-1/

for floppy's

https://www.lacie.co...st.htm?id=10050

http://www.ewent-onl...&productid=1388

http://www.delock.de...?setLanguage=en

 

and by the way, the magnetism goes with the years away on Floppy's, because, all they're years.. can it be, you can't read it anymore..

 

best regards

Blacky



#11 TheHive

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Posted 01 May 2015 - 06:19 AM


Imagine my surprise when she informed me that she had the required information 'on a disk' - imagine the look on my face when she pulled a 3.5" floppy disk out of her handbag!!! I had to apologise for laughing when she gave it to me, and then explain why I'd laughed. I showed her a USB thumb drive I had with me and explained that it was able to hold over 5000 times more information than the significantly larger Floppy she had given me - she looked genuinely shocked.

Now what the bloody hell do I do with it?

 

You take the floppy and the usb stick with you when you follow here back to her workplace were she might have a PC that still has the floppy drive.

Insert floppy and then insert usb stick. copy floppy content to usb stick.

You can always try a library or a school and see if they still have them.



#12 misty

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Posted 01 May 2015 - 10:23 AM

You take the floppy and the usb stick with you when you follow here back to her workplace were she might have a PC that still has the floppy drive.
Insert floppy and then insert usb stick. copy floppy content to usb stick.
You can always try a library or a school and see if they still have them.

@TheHive
If only life were so simply - it's not! The client hasn't worked for 10 years so I can't follow her back to work. And following women is kind of frowned upon.

I don't know about where you live, however if I turned up at a school to use a computer it would cause more trouble than following women home!

Now the local library - all their equipment is supplied by the same local authority that I work for!!!!!!!

Regards,

Misty

#13 Rootman

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Posted 01 May 2015 - 05:51 PM

Last year I finally cleaned out my junk closet and a cabinets in the back bedroom.  I must of had 2000 or more floppy disks, some software installs, most I bought for backups.  I must of had 200-300 old AOL disks in the mix. 

 

I had to actually throw about 1/3 out each week because they simply weighed too much for the wheely bin - it would of been FULL if I put them all in there. 

 

Ahhh, the good ol' days.






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