VOGONS


First post, by bjwil1991

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What are your thoughts between the real floppy drives and Emulated floppy drives (GoTek)?

Real Floppy Drives:

Pros:
Can be used as a backup storage, just in case the Hard Drive gets corrupted
First boot device for systems that cannot boot from a CD
Can play copy protected games
Slower read speeds for speed sensitive games or programs

Cons:
Drive gears can wear out (lubricating can give the drive longevity)
Floppies can lose their data if exposed to humidity (non-climately controlled area)
Requires swapping diskettes
Diskettes can lose their track (Track 0)

Emulated Floppy Drive:

Pros:
Faster swap times from OS installation to game installation
No gears to lubricate periodically

Cons:
Copy protected games cannot be launched and other software won't run appropriately (speed sensitive)
Requires a Flash Drive (not included)
Overseas (S&H charges are more than the item itself)
Requires 10 people to install the unit and more complicated than the real drive
Not period correct or nostalgic (Floppy drive noises)

Edit: changed the post on the user's request down below.

Last edited by bjwil1991 on 2017-10-19, 16:43. Edited 2 times in total.

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Reply 1 of 14, by Jade Falcon

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To add to the con list of Emulated floppy drive.

Not as simple to setup/use.
May cause problems with some setups, copy protected games like you stated.
Probably not something you can get locally.
Need a flash drive.
Not era correct.
No floppy disk drive sounds.

Reply 2 of 14, by bjwil1991

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Updated the post. Thanks for the suggestions.

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Reply 3 of 14, by agent_x007

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*Requires pendrive :
I'm using a 2GB microSD card with Kingston microSD to USB card reader (LINK).
Works great 😀

I would add "PC independent data writing" in emulation pros (as in, you don't need a floppy controller of any kind to write on pendrive/microSD card).
You only need software provided with Gotek drive, and a free USB port.

157143230295.png

Reply 4 of 14, by cyclone3d

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Not sure how you can say the shipping is more than the drive itself.

You can get one shipped for $18 from China to the USA.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/3-5-1-44MB-Upgrade-F … ST/272552214731

I plan on getting multiple when I finally decide to switch over.

If I really need floppies, I have a 2x speed 1.44Mb drive as well as some Dell laptop drives that have a USB port on them.

And If I really need a floppy for some odd copy protected game, I'll break down and use one of the few working real drives I have.

The 3.5" floppy drives are getting hard to find in working condition and the 5.25" drives are stupidly high priced. Guess I shouldn't have gotten rid of all my old floppy drives 10+ years ago, eh?

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Reply 5 of 14, by bjwil1991

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I have a dual Floppy drive in my Packard Bell Pack-Mate 28 Plus that I inherited last year (free), so I have 1 laptop and 5 desktops that have floppy drives. They all work still.

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Reply 6 of 14, by tabm0de

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I would say non of them are bad, but sadly there is no point of having a real floppy drive when the time comes to an end of the media market for the drive.

I would say dvd is kinda already also dead when it comes to computers, how many don’t use cd emulators, even windows mounts ISO’s files now days and all the games can be purchased online.

But ye real floppy first any day, but slowly media keep failing faster now days and some don’t want to spend to much time or money on it.

naa, nothing yet...

Reply 7 of 14, by cyclone3d

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bjwil1991 wrote:

I have a dual Floppy drive in my Packard Bell Pack-Mate 28 Plus that I inherited last year (free), so I have 1 laptop and 5 desktops that have floppy drives. They all work still.

Maybe I just have really bad luck with floppy drives then. I have a total of 1 regular 3.5" floppy drive that works properly out of the 4-5 I have tested.

I do have a few more that I picked up that I haven't had a chance to test yet.

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Reply 8 of 14, by Auzner

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I would say emulated is better. But I'm not sure why those products mainly use SD cards or USB storage, that's more of the same--physical media.
Ideally the floppy interface should look like a drive is there, but load disk images from a network server. To me, that's the most practical way to bridge that data to a legacy system.
For noises and nostalgia, have both installed in the system. You can demo/relive the floppy but use the network bridge day to day. I have both 5.25 and 3.5 drives but don't use them too much.

Sounds like a fun project for an FPGA kit

Reply 10 of 14, by chinny22

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Real Floppy Drives:

Pros:
-Can be used as a backup storage, just in case the Hard Drive gets corrupted
I wouldn't trust a disk for backup in this day and age. With CD's, DVD,s another PC

First boot device for systems that cannot boot from a CD
Emulators can do this as well

Can play copy protected games
Slower read speeds for speed sensitive games or programs
No argument here.

Cons:
Only point I disagree with here is
-Requires swapping diskettes
That's a Pro, its part of the fun! (seriously)

Emulated Floppy Drive:

Pros:
Faster data transfer, real drive always has to reread a sector or 2, emulated gets it 1st time every time

Cons:
Copy protected games cannot be launched and other software won't run appropriately (speed sensitive)
Does the HxC firmware get round this?

Requires a Flash Drive (not included), could argue FDD doesn't come with disks as well
Overseas (S&H charges are more than the item itself)

That's a good thing right? as in the drives are that cheap

Requires 10 people to install the unit and more complicated than the real drive
? I would say if anything its easier as its light enough to simply hang off a cable and not damage anything

Not period correct or nostalgic (Floppy drive noises)
This is the #1 thing against emulators, I would say its the only negative.

All my computers have the cheap gotek, I don't have a need of the advanced HxC firmware.
And I get why they have gone USB, It may not be the most efficient but its the default portable media of choice and readably available.

Some computers still have a real Floppy, and my original PC still doesn't feel/look right with out one, and it is fun to insert disk 1, insert disk2, etc sometimes
but installing Dos6 and windows 3x with the emulator was so quick and pleasant as well.

Reply 11 of 14, by bjwil1991

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There're games that cannot be imaged at all:

Examples

Lemmings
Sid Meier's Pirates
And More...

The way I can tell the difference between a copy protected and other floppy diskettes is the volume label when typing in the following command:

DIR A:

If it has mumbo jumbo in it, it's copy protected. If it's regular text, it's not copy protected. Think of copy protected games as Macrovision embedded in a VHS tape/VCR: can make the picture degrade or not work at all.

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Reply 12 of 14, by Jo22

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Lemmings..
It can be played without a perfect image. 😉
Legit DOS Lemmings.

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Reply 13 of 14, by KCompRoom2000

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So far I never found a need to use an emulated floppy drive so naturally I don't have any. Most of my desktops (and a few of my laptops) have real floppy drives, they sure do come in handy when I need to transfer some small files to a system that doesn't have USB/Internet access.

Here are my answers to some of your pros and cons below:

Real Floppy Drives:

Pros:
1. Can be used as a backup storage, just in case the Hard Drive gets corrupted
- You have a good point there. When a vintage DOS system suffers from a hard drive crash, there's always a DOS boot floppy to keep it running in the meantime.
2. First boot device for systems that cannot boot from a CD
- There are boot floppies that can be used to force those older systems to boot to a CD (a couple examples include: The All In One Boot Floppy, and PLOP Boot Manager).

Cons:
3. Requires swapping diskettes
- That can be a pain if you're dealing with a program that has more disk images than the number of blank floppies you have to spare, but there's also a good side to that con if you enjoy swapping disks during program installation.

Emulated Floppy Drive:

Cons:
5. Not period correct or nostalgic (Floppy drive noises)
- As someone who enjoys the nostalgic sound of floppy drives and old hard drives, I have to agree with you there. Seeing a system with just an emulated floppy drive installed just doesn't feel as sane as seeing a system with a real floppy drive installed.

Another con you might consider adding for emulated floppy drive:
- 5.25"-3.5" drive bay adapter and/or front panel modification may be required for systems without a proper 3.5" external (non-floppy) bay.

Reply 14 of 14, by Jo22

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There's another "Con" perhaps, in case there's some 3.3v logic inside of the floppy emulator:
https://db-electronics.ca/2017/07/05/the-dang … retro-consoles/

Personally, I've not encountered any issues so far by using diodes to drop down the voltages a bit.
But in theory, the article seems to be correct.

I recall that the Arduino Uno R3, for example, got an extra pin because of this 3.3v vs. 5v thing:
There's an extra pin (IOREF ?) for Arduino Shields, so they can decide wheter they do run in a 5v or 3.3v "mode".

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