Comments on: Windows 7 still clinging to floppy drives

By: Jimbo

Jimbo — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 14:59:26 +0000

The more anoying part is that only 1.44MB disks can be formatted since Windows XP – it is increasingly difficult to refresh or create media for vintage machines!

By: matt

matt — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 00:00:43 +0000

btw, windows 7 supports 5.25″ floppy discs too!! just like xp before it! long live 5.25

By: matt

matt — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 23:52:48 +0000

And why not keep the floppy drive? How much code does it take, practicaly none compared to how much code there is altogether. I think people like you forget about past technology too. I use old computers ALL the time where the floppy disc is the only way to transfer data. Heck, sometimes i have to transfer data via 5.25″ floppy discs henz why i have both a 3.5″ and a 5.25″ floppy disc drives in my pc which by the way is an Athlon 4200 @2.7ghz and a gts260!!!

I work alot with DOS, Acorn and alike. Theres no other way than using a floppy. and even in 10 years time i will continue to put a floppy or even two floppy drives (1 being my 5.25″) into my main PC. Even if i have to buy an SCSI card!!!

By: jonbirduk

jonbirduk — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 20:23:35 +0000

I regularly use the built-in floppy disc drive to update aircraft such as the modern ‘Fly-By-Wire’ Airbus A320’s Flight Management Computer’s Navigation Data-base every month. There are portable versions available with compact flash cards or USB, but I haven’t seen them. In fact, the vast majority of aircraft software is still held on floppy discs!

By: Darren

Darren — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 19:27:16 +0000

What’s more interesting is that Windows 7 still offers the chance to format a floppy as an MS-DOS startup disk (containing a butchered copy of DOS 8 from Windows ME, 10 years old!). Windows 7 also has a nice shiny icon for the 5.25″ floppy that I’ve hooked up to my 3-month-old Core2 Duo PC – and yes, it recognises and handles 360K floppies just fine!

By: JH

JH — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 18:38:05 +0000

To the person that suggested PS/2 is useless: I have a PS/2 keyboard and mouse. Although the better quality products may be USB, my keyboard is perfectly good, and it saves confusion whilst setting up. PS/2 is probably cheaper than USB. I still often use floppies, if I hadn’t been able to find an old flash drive that worked in my old computer I would have had to use floppies to load the drivers for flash drives.

By: shebanti

shebanti — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 14:59:43 +0000

Thanks for the article it was informative because the other month I was wondering if the floppy would still be of use in Windows 7! I`m sure the floppy option is kept for users in places were floppies are still used ………as for the save icon in office I think the floppy disk icon is deserved becaused the floppy disk is the only storage format that has dominated the computing landscape for decades before being upstaged by other formats (even earlier computers with no hard drives had floppy drives ) As for people with data on floppy disks buy some extra floppy drives for future use as they may disappear soon remember what happened to NASA and its data …..on a light note floppy disks leave me with a warm feeling because every time I hear or read about them I get all nostalgic…….!

By: Dave Mishem

Dave Mishem — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 20:37:52 +0000

Oh, gee, let me see if I can remember when I last used a floppy drive…

It was last Thursday, when I had to create a BIOS flash disk for a computer. Yeah, you can supposedly do it via USB, IF the device capacity is right and IF the BIOS works ok with that particular device and IF… oh, you get the picture.

Floppies are still around because they work. Does your office have a fax machine?

By: Keilaron

Keilaron — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 13:35:54 +0000

Ridiculous article: Just because it gives you the option and mentions it first (OH NO!) doesn’t mean it’s CLINGING to it. While it’s unlikely for any newer system to have a floppy drive, my last system had one and had the specs to run WIndows 7. Remember, the requirements for 7 are LESS than Vista, not more.

By: Steve

Steve — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 11:21:07 +0000

People! You all should be updating your BIOS regularly with you FLOPPY DRIVE (except a few ;aptops that can be updated in Windows). If you haven’t then you could be missing our on extra speed due to fixed bugs or extra BIOS options or more CPU/RAM/etc compatibility. Floppy cannot die until the whole BIOS system is redesigned (or more specifically, redesigned and actually implimented, unlike all the other alternatives that have been tested).