Floppy disk drives in 2024
Posted: Thu Feb 15, 2024 4:03 am
Hey guys, if you aren't using older PCs with reliable drives what are good options for reading 3.5" disks? Are old drives actually as reliable as I imagine? It's been years!
I'm trying to read a box full of old home disks from the 90s. The disk drive is bytecc bt-144 which is a super cheap plug-n-play usb device. Some disks read fine but others don't, maybe that's them sitting in a box for 25 years. The only disk so far without errors was one I discovered my older brother made of lo-res Jenny McCarthy nude pics! hahaha
Some disks read fast, some slow. I wonder if a better drive would read the disks better? Is that even possible? Is it just old faulty disks? I don't know. That's a grandma question but pardon me. I do feel like a grandma with this old stuff.
I've been using a shareware program called Bad Copy Pro to fix corrupted files, which is hit or miss (depending on all the state of disk I suppose.) If it can fix a file which Windows Explorer reads, then great. What couldn't be copied, now can be. But explorer doesn't show all the files and in some cases not reading disks at all. Exporting files discovered by Bad Copy Pro requires a license and I'm a little cheap for the time being, and looking for alternatives. But it is a good program and I'm considering buying the license.
One disk that did read ok had a thief exported from Quest for Glory 1 in June of 1996, who I think I'll use to finally try out QfG2 vga.
I haven't tried any factory game disks on the usb drive, only ones with my own old saved stuff. Maybe factory disks will hold up better, or is it just the POS drive that can't read disks at all?
I'm trying to read a box full of old home disks from the 90s. The disk drive is bytecc bt-144 which is a super cheap plug-n-play usb device. Some disks read fine but others don't, maybe that's them sitting in a box for 25 years. The only disk so far without errors was one I discovered my older brother made of lo-res Jenny McCarthy nude pics! hahaha
Some disks read fast, some slow. I wonder if a better drive would read the disks better? Is that even possible? Is it just old faulty disks? I don't know. That's a grandma question but pardon me. I do feel like a grandma with this old stuff.
I've been using a shareware program called Bad Copy Pro to fix corrupted files, which is hit or miss (depending on all the state of disk I suppose.) If it can fix a file which Windows Explorer reads, then great. What couldn't be copied, now can be. But explorer doesn't show all the files and in some cases not reading disks at all. Exporting files discovered by Bad Copy Pro requires a license and I'm a little cheap for the time being, and looking for alternatives. But it is a good program and I'm considering buying the license.
One disk that did read ok had a thief exported from Quest for Glory 1 in June of 1996, who I think I'll use to finally try out QfG2 vga.
I haven't tried any factory game disks on the usb drive, only ones with my own old saved stuff. Maybe factory disks will hold up better, or is it just the POS drive that can't read disks at all?