Sony are ceasing production of 3.5" floppies

[andrewducker]

[Poll #1556410]

Comments

[andrewducker]

The last time I saw some floppies was when Ed found an old box of them lying about, I think. It's been CDs or USB keys for _aaaages_ for me.

[simont]

I stood next to somebody using a floppy last week, but didn't inhale lay a finger on it myself.

[henriksdal.livejournal.com]

I last saw them in Macedonia in 2004

[drplokta]

Are we counting bootable disk images that were originally floppy disks?

[randomchris.livejournal.com]

I used them up until I got a USB stick a year or so ago.

[princealbert.livejournal.com]

Arcade/flight sims I worked on in 1995 still used 8" floppies.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Month, and I *hate* it. Stupid obsolete things in use by stupid obsolete people!

[marrog.livejournal.com]

I know I used them in my first year at uni, and then I started just using webmail as storage instead.

[usmu.livejournal.com]

I have a whole load of them in the attic, along with the computer that goes with it. Same goes for the AT my father got the family in the very early 90s. EGA, 20 mb hard disk, DOS operated (windows 3.1 could run on the machine but was utterly useless) and 5,25" floppies. The ones that would actually flop. I have a whole load of those in the attic as well. Don't think I'll ever use them again, but I just can't get myself to get rid of them.

[tamaranth.livejournal.com]

I did get a floppy disk sent to me in the post last year, by an old client who wanted me to amend the system I wrote for them in, er, 2001. Told her I didn't have anything capable of reading it any more ...

[recycled-sales.livejournal.com]

BIOS updates used to be floppy only as USB devices weren't supported. Thankfully they've overcome that with in OS updates and BIOS USB support.

So yeah, 3 years ago for a very minor reason - much longer for actual proper use.

[momentsmusicaux.livejournal.com]

I think within the last five years I was still tinkering with old machines that needed a boot floppy to make them then go on to boot from a CD.

[in-thy-bounty.livejournal.com]

The last I recall using them was for an updated database of Championship Manager 97/98. It was all cds after that all the way through to USB sticks.

[lizw.livejournal.com]

I know what it is really, but I think the last time I used one was to store my undergrad dissertation, which is now nineteen years ago.

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

Somewhere on Tony's link blog the article was linked to with title "the beginning of the end for floppy disks?" I said "should that be the END of the end...?" :)

[don-fitch.livejournal.com]

Actually, they were what I call "crispies" -- a floppy disk inside a hard (3.5 inch?) rectangular casing. Still have a couple of unopened boxes of them around here someplace, but have been throwing used ones in the trash as I come across them because the drive in my old/back-up computer no longer works.

I like your option "A what?".

[dreema.livejournal.com]

we've been redoing a few servers here recently, and rather than fanny about with slipstreaming drivers onto boot cds, it's often easier to dump the raid drivers onto floppy and hit F6 at the relevant point.

[bohemiancoast.livejournal.com]

Between three and five years ago; but here's the kicker -- only because there were a batch of old ones around and I wanted to find out what was on them before destroying them.

Otherwise, I haven't used a floppy for personal use at all since I first got a Mac, and that was over eight years ago. I'm much more gutted about the demise of cassette tapes than I am about floppies to be honest. Though I'm about to acquire (a) a commercial cassette tape, and (b) a copy of some music to learn on cassette tape. I am boggled by both these things, but fortunately have a cassette deck around here (designed for the transferring of information from cassette deck to MP3).

Separately, I was explaining this research to Marianne earlier today, and discovered that she had never seen a black and white TV or monitor. Other than on TV.

[cheekbones3.livejournal.com]

There's one sticking out of my computer right now.

[ajr.livejournal.com]

To qualify my answer: I found a cache of old floppy disks, and all I did was copy the contents to HDD before chucking the disks out.

[phillipalden.livejournal.com]

I have about ten 3.5" floppies that are "picture disks." We have close to ten computers in this house, but none of them have a 3.5" floppy slot.

I don't want to throw them away until I'm sure I have the pictures on some other kind of back-up media, but I know it's going to be a pain to check them out. Hopefully I can take my flash drive to the library in the hopes they have machines with the 3.5" slot.

[holyoutlaw.livejournal.com]

I have a friend who uses floppies to decorate her car:



The 5" floppies she has to paint. If she leaves them black, they melt off the car in direct sunlight.

[lionsphil.livejournal.com]

I've used low density floppy disks recently, and lament that people are growing up who will not recognize the noise of a drive chugging along.