8-inch floppies faded quickly, but 5.25-inch and 3.5-inch usage overlapped for a relatively long period of time. There were a large number or permutations of the 3.5-inch type, and actual capacity could vary by vendor according to how much of the disk was used, the file system, and a number of other factors. The storage and file system was generally proprietary to the vendor or operating system, CP\/M, DOS, Apple, etc., though there was some crossover.<\/p>\n

The floppy eventually faded from common use as programs and data sets outgrew its now quaint-seeming capacity. The arrival of new or newly affordable, faster, and more capacious technologies such as the hard drive and compact disc didn’t help. A number of other removable media technologies made dents as well, however, you could still find floppy drives on systems well into the new millennia.<\/p>\n

So here’s to you old friend, and thanks for saving me from that ridiculously unreliable (wrong resistor) cassette drive on my Atari 400. I’ll be eternally grateful.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ah, the floppy disk. How I miss thee. How I don’t. There was a certain tactile pleasure to inserting you into your drive, and in the early days, locking you in place. The audible click and\/or snap of the mechanism just added to the delight. Alas, you were too easy to spindle, fold, or mutilate; […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":2056,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n