The floppy disk drive (FDD) has been here for a long time now,
despite its limited capacity support of 1.44 MB. Many devices that support a
much larger storage capacity than the floppy disk have been launched
commercially in the last many years, yet the floppy has refused to move out of
the PC. Or is it the users who are not ready to let go the FDD?
"It is the emotional attachment that is keeping PC users
from parting with the FDD," says Jim Alfaro, Consultant, IBM Mobile
Computing Personal Systems Group. "It is high time we throw the floppy disk
drive out," adds he.
That floppies are an object of emotional attachment may be a bit
hard to digest. But, the fact remains that for just
Rs 500, FDDs are one of the cheapest and essential devices that run on the
computer. Besides, the floppy media cost just around Rs 20 which is a lot more
cheaper than any other storage media.
Despite a cost advantage, floppies have a bad reputation when it
comes to reliability. "Let us not look at the cheap cost that tags the
floppy and pay attention to the reliability aspect. Floppies are the most
unreliable medium for storage," says a storage expert.
Storage devices like the Zip, Jaz and MOD drives are expensive
(in the range of Rs 3,000 to Rs 20,000), but a lot more reliable. Then what is
it that has kept the FDD alive for so long?
One possible reason, says a systems integrator, is
"probably because the Windows OS that dominates the PC market. One needs a
bootable floppy disk to begin installation of most OSs," says he. However
with Microsoft introducing Windows OS on bootable CDs this argument does not
hold any punch.
Weakness of the floppy
Floppy becoming redundant is something which nobody wishes to
believe. But there are many big vendors who have realized the weaknesses of
floppy drives and bid goodbye to it. Apple found that floppies are not devices
for the future and removed the FDD altogether from their iMacs.
IBM did the same in some of their latest laptops and desktop,
and few other vendors did the same replacing the floppy drives with Zip drives
and CR-Writers. Lately, IBM replaced one of their laptop model with an
innovative utility – the numeric key pad extension. Whether this trend
continue is the big question.
A couple of years ago when prices of CD-writers became
affordable, prices of blank CD media also declined. Now one can get a blank CD
for around Rs 30-50. Compare this with the cost of a single floppy. At Rs 15-20
a floppy can store 1.44 MB, whereas the a blank CD can store 650-700 MB.
Here, the floppy stands to lose in terms of capacity, but gain
on its rewriting capabilities. Blank CDs are one-time writable if it has to be
read on any CD-ROM drive.
Rewritable CDs costing Rs 150-300 can overcome this problem, but
you need CD-writer to read such CDs as they cannot be read on CD-ROM drives.
In short, this means such CDs are convenient to be circulated
only among users who have CD-writer. This has been one of the reasons to hold on
to floppies.
Owning a decent CD-writer would cost anywhere between Rs 5,000
and 16,000. We can call this a lot cheaper from what it used to be two years
ago. But this price is nowhere close to Rs 500 for an FDD which is one of the
other reasons to stick to it.
Pick up in sales
Despite all these arguments, CD-writer and blank CD media sale
have picked up according to market sources. "Increased usage of CDs has
surely reduced the sales of floppies but not of FDDs. These are a must accessory
with every desktop," says Laxmichand Bathija, a Lamington Road reseller.
"We sell more blank CDs than floppies. But that does not mean floppy days
are over," says he.
Like Laxmichand, there are many resellers who feel floppies are
here to stay, at least for few more years. According to them, Indians are fast
to catch up with new technology, but price plays a very important role in their
buying decision. "Indian customers always look for an affordable
alternative first," says Laxmichand.
CDs are a reliable and affordable option for storage. But do you
require them? "Yes," says Jayant Madhav of Micro-point Electronics,
"Multimedia applications are demanding bigger and reliable
capacities."
Nowadays, a single Power-Point presentation can easily eat up to
2MB of space, or for that matter an MP3 file, which can take up around 4MB of
space. For such a file, floppies are of no help unless you split the files and
carry them in many floppies.
Splitting and recombining the files may be easy using utility
softwares. And even carrying the floppies would be easy. But, if just one floppy
gets corrupted then the entire presentation becomes useless.
Alternatives to floppies
In the last few months many other alternative to floppies have
entered the Indian market. Storage mediums the size of a thumb are promising
convenient and reliable option. These devices work on USB interface and have
decent storage capacity ranging from 32 MB to over 2 GB.
Few such devices in the market are the Trek Thumb-Drive and the
Pen Drive. Because of its tiny size, carrying it inside the pocket is just like
carrying a pen. There are no moving parts inside these devices and are hence
claimed very reliable. All one needs to use such device is a USB port on the
computer, which most computers have now-a-days.
The devices are plug-and-play and are detected in seconds as
soon as they is plugged in. It has been almost a year now since such drives came
to India. But the number of pieces sold so far are not very impressive.
The reason is again the same: price. A 32MB module would cost
around Rs 3,000 to Rs 4,000. Compare this with 22 floppies (approx. 32MB) at the
rate of Rs 15 comes to Rs 330, is 10 times cheaper.
"This is a test market for such drives. It will take some
time for the people to accept it," says a systems integrator. "As more
and more brands come in, the cost is sure to decline. I am sure then it will
become a very reliable and cost effective option for transferring decent amount
of data," he adds.
Another interesting product that threatens the FDD are ‘Memory
Sticks’. One of the biggest advantages of this medium is that it can be used
directly on many digital devices like digital cameras, mobile phones, photo
printers, and more. A reader is required to transfer data to and from this
medium. But here again the cost is on the higher side.
With so many devices available on Indian market shelves, it is
just the price factor that is a hindrance for sales. But prices are bound to
become affordable. "Maybe soon," feels a Lamington Road reseller. If
that happens, can we again say: ‘floppy days are over’?
NELSON JOHNY in Mumbai