Floppy Disks

Floppy Disks

Floppy disk as the Storage Device

A floppy disk is the disk storage which is created of thin disk and flexible magnetic storage medium and it is packed in a rectangular plastic medium. The data stored in the floppy disc drive is readable and writable. With the advent of external USB and greater storage devices as compared to floppy disks, floppy disks were hardly found in the computer systems.

Limited storage and sizes

Floppy disks were nearly 8 inch (200 mm) storage device which was reduced to 5.25 inches and then 3.5 inches which was 90mm. This storage device was introduced in mid 1970s and, in the first decade of the 21st century (Fletcher, 2007). When we talk about 2010, there were hardly computer systems containing flopy disk drives and, 3.5” floppies used as an external USB drive. This was because, floppy disks had limited usage and capacities. With the passage of time, technology has advanced three to four folds and, there is no need to use floppy disks as the external storage devices. Floppy disks were sensitive as compared to other external devices such as hand held USB which is harder and tougher than the floppy disks (Fletcher, 2007). There were several safety precautions in using the floppy disks because, floppy disks were much sensitive and any data could be erased. Floppy disks were sensitive and lost all the date when exposed to heat or water.

New Technologies

The first floppy disks was created in 1960s and, IBM had tried to improve the floppy disks but, failed to implement the technology for long term use. With the passage of time, capacity and size of floppy disks had reduced but, the data capacity was limited and, could not store huge amount of data. Today, business organizations and professional computer systems do not ...