Floppy Disk Drive on a Laptop?

[AngelofHarlem01]

I can't find it..are they not on laptops? There's a small slot on the side but the disk is quite a bit bigger than that, so I doubt that can be it.

My problem is I need to transfer school files to another computer with a working printer. Is my best bet to just email them to myself and print them from the other pc that way? Buy some kind of external floppy disk drive(how much do they cost?) or is there some mysterious disk drive hidden somewhere on my laptop lol?

 

[neutral]

If your laptop is fairly new, there is a good chance that it does not have a floppy drive. None of mine do, I'm not sure if Apple even offers them anymore.


Anyway, I didn't have a printer at home for a long time and I would sometimes email files to my Gmail account. Then I could access and print them anywhere that had internet access.

You said school files though, if you are on a school network you might have access to a network printer?

 

[Liesje]

My laptop is 4 years old and is new enough not to have one. The slot on the side is for laptop PCMCIA cards, like ethernet adapters.

If you don't already, I'd purchase a USB flash drive/"Disc-on-key" and find a computer that still has a floppy drive, transfer your files, trash all the floppies, and use the USB drive. Floppies contain moving mechanisms and magnetic parts, so they really only last a few years. Even if you don't ever use it, you could try to access the files a year from now and find that everything is corrupt. You can get external floppy drives, but it's more worth your money to get a flash drive instead.

 

[AngelofHarlem01]

That's a great idea about the disc on key, are those also the little USB sticks i see sometimes?

I'm unfortunately not hooked up to the school network at the moment, so i guess i'll just be emailing the files to myself until I can pick up one of those USB devices over the weekend hopefully.

 

[Liesje]

That's a great idea about the disc on key, are those also the little USB sticks i see sometimes?

I'm unfortunately not hooked up to the school network at the moment, so i guess i'll just be emailing the files to myself until I can pick up one of those USB devices over the weekend hopefully.

Yep, you can wear them around your neck or attach them to a keychain. I usually keep mine in my purse. You never know when you're going to want to save something (like if you're at a friend's house and she has some recent pictures, or a new song).

You can now get a 1GB for less than $30. I like to get smaller electronics from newegg.com because it's generally much cheaper than stores and the shipping is also very cheap.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.asp?N=2000170522+4025&Submit=ENE&SubCategory=522

 

[neutral]

Yeah that's a good idea. I got my USB drive for $9 at Target. It's only 64 megs though, I know I could have done better mail ordering.

 

[AngelofHarlem01]

thanks for all the help guys