To Be Announced...

When I was considering a new computer, I debated a few times back and forth about getting one of these, but fortunately I didn't have to debate too long because I was a bit shocked that they were no longer being offered by the manufacturer I bought my new recording studio computer from.

As I read this story, I began to have flashbacks of carrying boxes of these things to work with me each day. Heck, even the Zip drives are being discontinued in favor of Thumb-drives.

PC World says farewell to floppy

The time has come to bid farewell to one of the PC's more stalwart friends - the floppy disk.

Computing superstore PC World said it will no longer sell the storage devices, affectionately known as floppies, once existing stock runs out.

New storage systems, coupled with a need to store more than the 1.44 megabytes of data held by a standard floppy, have led to its demise.

For conspiracy buffs, it comes on the heels of the release of Microsoft's new operating system update for Windows...called, Vista.

Interestingly, software giant Microsoft seems to be keeping the flame alight for the floppy.

Its newly-released operating system Vista still pays homage to it by continuing to use a floppy disk as the icon for saving a document in Microsoft Word 2007.

Here are some of the interesting fun facts about the floppy disk.

• The original floppy disk held 100KB of data. That was the medium home use ones that used to fit in my old computer were 5-1/4 inches. I remember the big 8-inch ones we used in the school computer.

• Hell...I remember using punch cards.

• Did you ever buy DOUBLE SIDED disks and think you were something special? In the early days, manufacturers of "single sided" floppy disks would advise consumers that they "certified" only one side (hence the name single-sided), and if the user wanted to use the other side of the diskette, they should buy the more expensive "double-sided" variety of floppy disks. It really made no difference which side you used...they were both the same.

• The standard disk held 1.44 megabytes of data - equivalent today to a three-minute song.

• In South Africa, floppy disks are commonly known as stiffies.

• There is an urban myth that it is safe to view a solar eclipse through the film of a floppy removed from its case. Despite some anecdotal support, this is in fact dangerous and can lead to retinal damage and even blindness.

• New Order's classic dance track "Blue Monday" owes some of its popularity to the 12-inch version of the single initially being shipped in a sleeve designed to resemble a 5¼-inch floppy. Legend has it that it was so expensive to produce the sleeve that Factory Records lost money despite the single's runaway successl.

From: Wikipedia history of Floppy Disks

Sniffle...

Leave your comments on Floppy Disks below if you like...sniff...

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