Yahoo! News Story - Floppy Disk Becoming Relic of the Past (fwd)

From: Fred Cisin <cisin_at_xenosoft.com>
Date: Mon Sep 20 15:25:35 2004

On Sun, 19 Sep 2004, Ronald Wayne wrote:
> If the floppy disk disappeared, I would notice (I use them) but would
> not care.

For that matter, most of US could disappear without anybody noticing nor
caring. If not for Frank's alert investigation, we wouldn't have even
known about Don's death for a long time.

> It is also unfair to say the floppy disk is disappearing
> when CD-ROMs/CD-Rs/CD-RWs are serving similar purposes: to distribute
> and install software, to exchange data between machines or people, and
> to backup data. The main difference is the technology.

That's right. CDR/RW is the current "floppy" for many systems.
and USB flash drive is the current "floppy for many others.

> Besides, floppy diskettes are not as uniform as the article implies.
> They seem to suggest that there are two sizes, then leave it at that.
> Well, there were different densities and encodings too. Oh, and there
> were more than two physical sizes. (IIRC, 8" and 12" was common.
> Then there is all of the similar-but-failed technologies.)

12", if it ever existed, was NEVER common.
I'd gladly trade a 3" and a 3.25" for one.

The common sizes were 8 (with a few physical variations), 5.25 (with many
physical variations), 3", 3.25", 3.5" (with a few evolutionary steps, and
2 main physical varieties), 2", 2.5", 2.9", 3.9".

In addition to the physical varieties, there are thousands of physically
similar disks with mutually incompatible formats.

> I couldn't
> care less if they disappeared, because all of those different formats
> make it next to impossible to transfer data between different
> computers.

YOU might not care, but that is pretty damn insensitive towards those of
us who DO need and use them.

During the day today, I will use four to eight different machines, only
one of which is mine, and therefore permissible to make any changes to.
Some have USB ports; some do not.
Some have ZIP drives (mostly 100M); some do not.
Hardly any have CDR or CDRW.
But they ALL have floppy drives, including the one month old HPaq
machines.

I WILL be using floppies today.

> Now if you were to say that the serial port is disappearing ... well
> then I would be concerned.

Be converned.
Be very concerned.
RS232 serial is disappearing rapidly, usually replaced by USB.

--
Grumpy Ol' Fred     		cisin_at_xenosoft.com
Received on Mon Sep 20 2004 - 15:25:35 BST

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