New Computers: Do you miss the floppy drives?

[HexOnxOnx]

On Wednesday I picked up a new IBM Thinkpad. The only thing I was disappointed in was that it had a PC Card slot instead of a floppy drive. I do kind of miss the drive because it was so easy to transfer a file or two between computers so easily. I didn't want to not get this computer just for that reason, it had everything and more I wanted.

I can't think of a use for the PC slot for now, my camera records pics onto the cd in the camera so that leaves that out.

[ManagerJosh]

You could always buy external usb floppy drives. They go for about $31.00

[DWZ]

I got my laptop around this time last year and by default it didn't come with a floppy disk drive. I forked out the extra $100 or whatever to get a floppy drive I could swap with my CD drive.

But really, I think I've used it like 3 times over that year? I mean, I'm finding these days if I want to copy a file to another computer, I use my home network. Only very rarely I need to use the floppy drive, which is when I'm creating boot disks etc which I could easily do on one of my other desktop computers.

So if I came to buy another laptop today, I don't think I'd get the floppy disk drive if it didn't come standard.

[ManagerJosh]

I also hope your Laptop came with a CD-RW drive..beats having a floppy plus more durable

[HexOnxOnx]

I also hope your Laptop came with a CD-RW drive..beats having a floppy plus more durable

LOL Of course it came with the CR-RW/DVD drive. I can't live without one of those!

[Marco]

I built my new PC about two months back, and didn't bother to get a floppy drive. I don't miss it

[merk]

Ive not used a floppy drive at all over the last 13 months, except for my TAFE courses (because my moronic teachers cant handle emailed files).

Ive found if you disable all olden day ports on your machine it also speeds up POST quite a bit.

[Stryker]

Bah, no-one needs a floppy drive anymore. When I built my new computer I didn't bother getting one at all. They're slow, noisey and have limited capacity. What I do is use a Compact Flash/Smart Media card reader (attached via a USB port) and use CF cards to store and transport data. You can now buy them in sizes up to 1 GB though I just have a few 128mb ones. If your computer supports USB 2.0 they're very fast, and much more reliable than floppies.

[poolking]

Whats a floppy drive?

[MrNase]

i got an usb stick with my laptop 256 mb is enough for most files

[Mainer82]

Or get a USB Memory stick from Crucial.

My gf has this one for college, it works great.

[Wayne Luke]

Starting next year, I will be reselling computers and prebuilt laptops. None of them will come with a floppy drive as standard. They will only be options.

Out of my 4 computers, 2 do not have floppy drives. I haven't used a floppy in over 2 years. In order to transfer files locally, we simply use the network. To get files from others, there is email. If I have to physically carry a file from one PC to another for some reason we use USB based flash memory pens.

Personally, I see no use for the floppy. CD-RW is a lot more versatile and cheaper in the long run.

[fury]

I haven't had a floppy drive permanently installed on any of my computers in over 4 years. The only time I had one was a few months ago and it was to put my RAID driver disk in so I could install Windows on a RAID0 array.

Speaking of RAID driver disks, why doesn't Windows setup give you the option to search for the driver on a CD? No motherboards come with floppies for them anymore.

[N9ne]

Floopie Disc?

Never heard of it

[Mainer82]

I think the last time I used a floppy was for a BIOS update. But you can use a USB memory stick to do that now.