A reusable magnetic storage medium introduced by IBM in 1971. It was called a floppy because the first varieties were housed in bendable jackets. Woefully undersized for today's use, it is no longer standard equipment on computers. However, until the early 1990s, the floppy was the primary method for distributing software and was widely used for backup. By the mid-1990s, it had mostly given way to the CD-ROM.
A Circle of Double-Sided Magnetic Tape
Also called a "diskette," the floppy is a flexible circle of magnetic material similar to magnetic tape, except that both sides are used. The drive grabs the floppy's center and spins it inside its housing. The read/write head contacts the surface through an opening in the plastic shell or envelope. Floppies rotate at 300 RPM, which is from 10 to 30 times slower than a hard disk. They are also at rest until a data transfer is requested. Following are the three types developed, from newest to oldest, and their raw, uncompressed storage capacity.
Although floppy disks look the same, what is recorded on them determines their capacity and compatibility. Every new floppy must be "formatted," which records the sectors on the disk that hold the data. See format program, magnetic disk and high-capacity floppy.
Floppy Formats
Although ubiquitous in their heyday, the 5.25" diskette was surpassed by the 3.5" disk in the 1980s, which gave way to the CD-ROM in the 1990s.
Anatomy of a Floppy
There is quite a bit inside a floppy disk considering they can be purchased for less than a quarter.
A Floppy-Based Computer
Floppy-based computers such as this Kaypro portable were the rage in the late 1970s and early 1980s. You typically booted the computer with the operating system in the first drive and saved your data on the floppy in the second one.
The Handwriting on the Wall
This 1999 headline foretold the floppy's future. Their value as a storage and distribution medium today is nil. (Article headline courtesy of the Philadelphia Inquirer.)
A Circle of Double-Sided Magnetic Tape
Also called a "diskette," the floppy is a flexible circle of magnetic material similar to magnetic tape, except that both sides are used. The drive grabs the floppy's center and spins it inside its housing. The read/write head contacts the surface through an opening in the plastic shell or envelope. Floppies rotate at 300 RPM, which is from 10 to 30 times slower than a hard disk. They are also at rest until a data transfer is requested. Following are the three types developed, from newest to oldest, and their raw, uncompressed storage capacity.
Final
Storage
Housing Capacity Capacity Range Creator
3.5" rigid 1.44MB 400KB - 1.44MB Sony
3.5" rigid 2.88MB (See ED.) IBM
5.25" flexible 1.2MB 100KB - 1.2MB Shugart
8" flexible 500KB 100 - 500KB IBM
Although floppy disks look the same, what is recorded on them determines their capacity and compatibility. Every new floppy must be "formatted," which records the sectors on the disk that hold the data. See format program, magnetic disk and high-capacity floppy.
Floppy Formats
Although ubiquitous in their heyday, the 5.25" diskette was surpassed by the 3.5" disk in the 1980s, which gave way to the CD-ROM in the 1990s.
Anatomy of a Floppy
There is quite a bit inside a floppy disk considering they can be purchased for less than a quarter.
A Floppy-Based Computer
Floppy-based computers such as this Kaypro portable were the rage in the late 1970s and early 1980s. You typically booted the computer with the operating system in the first drive and saved your data on the floppy in the second one.
The Handwriting on the Wall
This 1999 headline foretold the floppy's future. Their value as a storage and distribution medium today is nil. (Article headline courtesy of the Philadelphia Inquirer.)
 | Reproduced with permission from Computer Desktop Encyclopedia. Copyright (c) 1981-2009 The Computer Language Company Inc. All rights reserved. |
Additional Resources
- Data Destroyer 10.24 (Windows)
- A program for secure file deletion and disk wipe which destroys (or purges, by overwriting) data in files on floppy, ZIP or hard disk so that the data cannot be recovered. A single file can be purged or, in batch mode, multiple files can be purged in one operation. Selected...
- Software downloads 2009-11-01
- WinImage 8.50 (Windows)
- WinImage is a powerful disk utility that enables users to create disk images from floppy disks, extract files from image files, create empty images, write the images back to floppy disks. WinImage also supports many different standard and non-standard image file formats, including the Microsoft DMF format.
- Software downloads 2009-10-30
- 1st Disk Drive Protector 3.3 (Windows)
- Protect your PC from abusive use of removable media with 1st Disk Drive Protector. This software will easily help you enforce whether your users are allowed to use removable media or access your local drives. You can not only hide, lock and prevent usage of local, network, Floppy and USB...
- Software downloads 2009-10-23
- Solo Antivirus 9.0 (Windows)
- Solo Antivirus detects and removes all types of viruses and spyware. It contains a unique system integrity checker to protect your system from new Internet worms, backdoors, and spyware. Solo includes features such as a real-time sentry system, an automatic update facility, a schedule scan facility, an emergency disk tool.Other...
- Software downloads 2009-10-23
- Active@ Kill Disk - Hard Drive Eraser 5.1 (Windows)
- Active@ KillDisk - Hard Drive Eraser is powerful and compact software that allows you to destroy all data on hard and floppy drives completely, excluding any possibility of future recovery of deleted files and folders. It's a hard drive and partition eraser utility. Active@ KillDisk conforms to US Department of...
- Software downloads 2009-10-07
- Sanmaxi Floppy Disk Data Recovery 5.0.1 (Windows)
- Sanmaxi Floppy Disk Data Recovery recovers deleted files and folders from a floppy disk. It can recover accidentally deleted files and restore corrupted files. The software supports inaccessible floppy disk. It can effectively recover and rescue corrupted or lost data from damaged, unreadable or defective disks.
- Software downloads 2009-10-01
- Floppy Zip Disk Rescue 1.1 (Windows)
- Floppy Zip Disk Rescue is an easy-to-use tool to rescue corrupt file from Floppy disk and ZIP disk or other peripheral devices, It fast scans disk sectors, rescues the damaged files and copies the correct data to hard disk as possible as it can. The program is especially effective for...
- Software downloads 2009-09-27
- CPPBackup 1.5.4 (Windows)
- CPPBackup software is designed to back up your critical data to a local disk, the Network Neighborhood, or remote FTP servers. You can copy your important data files to another location on your local hard drive, network hard drive, floppy disks, zip drives, or CD-RWs. You can copy files as...
- Software downloads 2009-09-22
- Time to ditch the optical drive, once and for all
- Once heralded as the second coming of data storage, the sun has finally set on the optical drive as an effective vehicle for data storage and delivery. Optical drives are simply too small and too slow to be practical. Single layer discs hold 4.7GB while double layer discs can hold...
- Blog posts 2009-09-16
- Quad-core CPU for $99 ... from AMD
- The Athlon II X2 comes with 1MB...L2 per core. It's too bad they didn't use 1MB per core for the X4.2M divided by 4 is 512KNope, it comes with 2MB of L2, divided by 4 cores gives us 512K per core.Adrian has it right.BradDid you read his Post?He said "Too...
- Discussion threads 2009-09-16
- Win File Recovery 1.0.0.1 (Windows)
- Win File Recovery is a comprehensive file recovery software to recover file on major windows operating system. It recovers files emptied from the Recycle Bin, lost due to hard drive crash, formatted or damaged hard drive, virus infection and other unknown reasons. Support recovery of all major file types, include...
- Software downloads 2009-09-05
- If a flash drive infects a network, who's to blame?
- I think the answer could be both are to blame...More more data i could give a clear cut answer such as 1. was there a policy in place that addressed flash drive useage. 2. Did IT limit flash drive useage with admin tools. So who's to blame i cannot say...
- Discussion threads 2009-09-04
- SOHO Labels 4.1 (Mac)
- SOHO Labels & Envelopes is the fastest way to design and print professional labels, envelopes, and letterhead on your Macintosh. It's a complete design kit that includes 13,000+ designer graphics, 50 Bitstream commercial-grade fonts, and hundreds of ready-made designs. It supports over 1,500 label and envelope stocks including Avery, DYMO,...
- Software downloads 2009-09-02
- Data Destroyer Disk Wipe 10.13 (Windows)
- A disk wipe program which destroys by overwriting many times data in files on floppy, ZIP, or hard disk so that the data cannot be recovered. Selected top-level files and folders can be excluded. The user can specify the type of purge up to DoD standards for disk sanitizatiion. Disk...
- Software downloads 2009-08-30
- Dell joins in on Microsoft's appeal of Word injunction
- Good, maybe these three companies will show that i4i cannot just bully people around however they please. There should have never been an injunction on Word anyway.I wouldn't take anything from groklaw too seriously. Especially since PJ is not a lawyer.RE: Dell joins in on Microsoft's appeal of...
- Discussion threads 2009-08-27
- AnyFound Data Recovery 4.8 (Windows)
- AnyFound Data Recovery Software helps you to search, locate and recover all your inaccessible and lost data due to accidental format, software malfunction, file or directory deletion, virus attack, unexpected system shutdown and sabotage. Its advanced features like advance search, enhanced Music, Video recovery, File preview, Raw Recovery from hard...
- Software downloads 2009-08-27
- Visual CD 4.2 (Windows)
- Visual CD is a disk cataloging tool to index CD/DVDs, floppy disks, hard disks, and even folders. You can then explore the disk catalogs, search files and folders, create MP3 playlist file without having the physical disks in the drive. Upon insertion of the corresponding disk, you can open files,...
- Software downloads 2009-08-27
- Softgroup .Net Combos Controls 2.0.3387 (Windows)
- .Net Combos Controls features: focusStyle with alphablend effetcs of focus and selection, customizable BackColor, ForeColor and Font, flatStyle property, automatic Tooltip of selected item, auto-adjust of combo dropped down window width, display list of System Colors or Know colors, display color box tectangle with text, any item text can be...
- Software downloads 2009-08-10
- MagicISO Maker 5.5 build 276 (Windows)
- MagicISO Maker is a CD/DVD-image-file editor, CD/DVD burner, and CD/DVD-backup tool. It can directly create, edit, extract, and burn ISO files. It also can convert almost all CD and DVD image formats to ISO and BIN/CUE. With MagicISO, you can handle DVD images up to 10GB; make CD/DVD-image files from...
- Software downloads 2009-08-02
- WinHex 15.4 (Windows)
- WinHex is a universal hexadecimal editor, particularly helpful in the realm of computer forensics, data recovery, low-level data processing, and IT security. An advanced tool for everyday and emergency use: inspect and edit all kinds of files, recover deleted files or lost data from hard drives with corrupt file systems...
- Software downloads 2009-08-02
Neighboring Terms
Premier Vendor Content Whitepapers, webcasts & resources from our Power Center Sponsors
SmartPlanet
- Thought-provoking progressive ideas on diverse topics that intersect with technology, business, and life, and matter to the world at large. Visit SmartPlanet
- More from IBM
-
- Innovate your business' process model, play against the market, compete against others on our scoreboards and WIN! Try INNOV8 2.0: A BPM Simulator
- Enabling Real-World Business Transformation through IBM Service Management Read the EMA Analyst Report
