Question about floppy disks?

Question

I have a flat screen, desk computer that's relatively new *I've only had it about a year - a year and a half*. We got it when our old one *and first computer we ever got* went out.

Answer 1

First of all, are you sure your new computer has a floppy disk drive? It seems to me that they stopped including them a couple of years ago.



If so, the floppy disk is in those hard plastic squares about 3.5"

Answer 2

Floppies disks were a way of storing data. They were square in shape, either 5" or 3.5" in size. The actual disc was inside, and was made from the same material you'd see in an audio or video cassette, only it in a disc shape.



Floppies didn't hold very much. The last popular format held 1.44MB (that's megabytes) For awhile another format, the Zip Disk, was popular. These looked like floppies, but were about twice as thick. They could hold 100MB, making them popular for offices since you could rewrite them, unlike CD.



Once CD burners became really cheap, the floppy basically started dying out. Every computer by that time at least had a CD drive, and software companies had long since stopped distributing software on floppies.



Then USB thumbdrives started to appear. These have quickly replaced the function that Floppies had, in terms of being a portable, easy to use method of carrying data between computers.



Most computers today don't even have a floppy drive. Floppies are just too old, slow, and small. Heck, I saw a box of Sugar Pops that was giving away a 1GB thumb drive. That's almost 700(!) floppy disks!



While people once used floppies to make backups, as you describe, nowadays people use USB thumbdrives or a USB hard drive if they have a lot of data they want to backup.



The point of backup is to have a 2nd copy in case something happens to your computer's main hard drive. Most USB hard drives come with automated backup software, making it very easy to automate the process. Otherwise you can also use a thumbdrive. When you insert the thumbdrive, it will show up like another hard drive on your computer. You can drag&drop files onto it as normal. The thumbdrive is nice because it's small, so you can take the files with you more easily.

Answer 3

A floppy disk is a small magnetic disk with a protective plastic cover to keep it from getting damaged. It is no longer used by many people because it can only hold 1.44MB. By comparison many flash drives hold 2GB=2048MB.



By stuff on "Microsoft" I assume you mean Microsoft Office: Word, Excel, Powerpoint, Access etc. Actually, floppies are great for Microsoft Office documents without lots of graphcis because they are usually 12KB=0.01MB. If you have lots of graphics your files size might be 102KB=0.09MB. Floppy disks have been "discontinued" because they're not good for anything besides word documents, they're slow, more likely to be corrupted, and flash drives are much cheaper than they used to be.



When you want to open a floppy disk, go to "My Computer" and look for something called "3½ Floppy (A:)". (I call it a "3½ floppy A") Click on it and you will see a light under the floppy disk come on. This means it is being accessed. NEVER take out a floppy disk when the light is on. After a few seconds you will see the contents of the disk. To save to a floppy choose ""3½ Floppy (A:)". When you want to eject it simply push the eject button. I don't think floppy disks are sold, but you are most likely going to have some at your house. Feel free to erase any disks are labeled "Windows 95...." or "Windows 98....".

Answer 4

Your new computer most likely does not have a Floppy drive. This is the thin 3.5 inch plastic square disk. If you have old floppy disks and need to read them then you can buy an external floppy drive (USB connection) fairly cheap. Or, If there are just a few items or documents you need off a floppy then just find a PC with a floppy drive (friend or school/library) and copy the contents to a flash drive. If you don't need the data on your old "floppies" then don't worry. Everyone uses flash drives (sometimes called thumb drives) these days.

Answer 5

Hey There,

If you want to back up your date I would suggest picking up an external storage device. They can range from 40-150 dollars varying on how much space you want. A good suggestion is 500 GB. Floppy Disks are those black diskettes that stand about four inches tall and 3.5 inches across. These devices are normally no longer in use for contemporary computer users. A floppy will not work for you because it cannot hold very much data. Go on down to your local office max or best buy and just tell the guy behind the counter you need a external hard drive. And you want roughly 500 Gigs of space. (That's plenty) . 500 Gigs should be around 70 to 120 dollars. Any more then that and I would switch stores. Once you have your drive, plug it into your PC and you should be able to immediately access it through an icon in My Computer. After that, just drag and drop what you want to save. Hope that helps.

Answer 6

Very hardly are floppy's and floppy drives used anymore. in actuality, i could threat to declare that except spec'd out (incredibly extra), you does not come across a computing gadget on the industry on the instant with a floppy force put in in it. No, you may no longer 'decrease a CD-rom smaller - thoroughly distinctive technologies and that they are no the place close to well matched. you may no longer purchase floppy disks that carry over a million.44mb -- you may keep better than a million.44mb on a floppy by "zipping" the data which might compress all of it the way down to a length smaller than a million.44mb if it may. The previous 5 a million/4" floppy disks held variety of ninety-100k of data. NO, WinXP does not have the potential to examine an previous 5 a million/4" floppy in spite of in case you may get a force to hook as much as the laptop. Sorry... (besides, Apple connections have been frequently SCSI, serial, or AppleTalk - 9 pin din and have been basically well matched with Apple products.) desire this helped. Maggie

Answer 7

Floppy disks are way out of date. If you want to save your files to an external drive (floppy disk, CDR,DVD) use a DVD. It can hold a ridiculous amount more than a floppy disk. If you only want to keep small files you could use a CD. To put them onto a disk you have to have CD/DVD burning software. There are loads of free ones. You can just Google it. And if you want to put it back onto your computer, put the disk in and it will give you options to what you want to do with those files

Answer 8

Um, a floppy disc is a super old kind of USB drive. They're relatively cheap, but have very limited storage space. I doubt a newer computer will have a floppy disc drive. I used that back in 2001 for microsoft word documents at school.. You might want to get a USB flash drive instead.

Answer 9

If you need to take documents with you, get a flash/thumb drive. The floppy is old technology and doesn't have very much and when you get to where you are going, chances are, they won't have a floppy drive.

Answer 10

You ask alot of question.



First see if you even have one on your computer. It looks like a thin slot about 5 inches wide on the FRONT of the computer.



That drive holds 1.44meg disks. You can buy them at the computer store.



You can use them to back stuff up or transfer files, etc.



They are only 1.44megs. To put it a better way, you would need between 2 and 8 disks to fit one normal song on the radio.



So they only hold small files.

Answer 11

A floppy disk is what was used as a storage device before flash drives, memory cards, and cds/dvds...



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floppy_disk



I don't your new computer even has a place for floppy disk, they are basically obsolete now.



A flash drive would work MUCH better to save stuff on:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USB_flash_drive

Answer 12

Hey, nice pretty hair bow!

You can buy floppy discs at any businees store. They are cheap.

You select the "save" icon after typing you document.

You can delete stuff from a floppy.

It comes up as a little PC icon. You can save 1.44MB.

But nowdays save stuff to a CD.

Answer 13

Floppy disks are old, slow, and don't hold very much, as opposed to your brain which is apparently young, slow, and doesn't hold very much! LOL just kidding!!!

Answer 14

Get real , get an educatrion, get a life, get an up to date computer.



no one uses floppy disc anymore



they went out with the ARK



get an education or get off the internet.











...

Answer 15

No need for me to answer, there are enough answers. I would suggest that you report the insulting Village Idiots who are nothing more than trash.

Answer 16

Girl i'll teach you about hard drives when you wanna know.