Niode wrote:This is a thread about the point of a floppy disk drive on a modern computer. Of which there is none.
It might seem at a glance that there's no point, but that's still wrong. Samsonlonghair almost touched on the reason, too. Let's suppose I've got some old machines around, and the best resource I have for getting software for them to run is the Internet. In that case I'll have to do the downloading from my modern PC, since I can't exactly run out and buy a modern Ethernet card for an Apple IIe or even a DOS PC that only takes ISA cards. Now if only there was a way to get that software from my modern hardware onto my older hardware...
Interaction between new systems and old systems is the reason computer stores still bother selling floppy drives and serial cables. It's a niche market, but there's enough of a real need to keep it going.
Yeah, you pretty much need a floppy disk on a modern PC to initially get software on a retro computer. This is one reason I haven't played with my Tandy 1000EX much. It doesn't have a serial port, and I don't have a 5.25" floppy on any of my other PCs. I can write DOS floppies with my CBM1571, but it's just too much of a pain.
Eventually I'll hack the Tandy PLUS ports into ISA slots and fit an ISA RS232 card to it. Then I can run SLIP on the thing and mTCP and FTP software over. Still need a floppy disk to put that software together though.
We are prepared to live in the plain and die in the plain!
Niode wrote:This is a thread about the point of a floppy disk drive on a modern computer. Of which there is none.
It might seem at a glance that there's no point, but that's still wrong. Samsonlonghair almost touched on the reason, too. Let's suppose I've got some old machines around, and the best resource I have for getting software for them to run is the Internet. In that case I'll have to do the downloading from my modern PC, since I can't exactly run out and buy a modern Ethernet card for an Apple IIe or even a DOS PC that only takes ISA cards. Now if only there was a way to get that software from my modern hardware onto my older hardware...
Interaction between new systems and old systems is the reason computer stores still bother selling floppy drives and serial cables. It's a niche market, but there's enough of a real need to keep it going.
Hatta wrote:
Eventually I'll hack the Tandy PLUS ports into ISA slots and fit an ISA RS232 card to it. Then I can run SLIP on the thing and mTCP and FTP software over. Still need a floppy disk to put that software together though.
I like buttons, shiny shiny buttons.
JT wrote:Yeah, like vampire aliens invade and hit us all with a ray beam that paralyzes all of our arms. The only way to deactivate the ray beam and fight back the vampire alien threat is with a complicated series of foot patterns on the device's control board that looks remarkably like a DDR pad. We will all praise this man for saving our lives and buy him a mountain of stuffed animals.
