floppy disks?

[David Fletcher]

On Sun, 2019-03-10 at 15:42 -0700, rikona wrote:
> On Sun, 10 Mar 2019 11:15:54 +0000
> David Fletcher <dave at thefletchers.net> wrote:
> 
> > 
> > On Fri, 2019-03-08 at 22:43 -0800, rikona wrote:
> > > 
> > > http://www.retrotechnology.com/herbs_stuff/s_drives_howto.html
> > > Good site. Looks like the really old stuff [non 3.5] will be
> > > quite
> > > hard
> > > to do.
> > >   
> > I've not read all of the thread but did a little searching and
> > found
> > this:-
> > http://deviceside.com/fc5025.html
> > which would get around the problem of only having a modern PC with
> > no
> > floppy ports on the motherboard. However this states that it only
> > works for reading 5.25" floppies.
> Interesting device. I'm not surprised that someone would build
> something to make that possible.
> 
> But - I've found an oldish, supposedly working but retired win box
> with
> a 5.25 drive. Will try to get this to work if indeed the box still
> works.
> 
> I do have some win comps on my local net, usually not on. I'm
> thinking
> it might be best to leave them off when I plug in the oldish box, so
> as not to allow any transfers of malware over the net. Would it be a
> good idea to first check the disk drive with anitmalware software
> before I make any connection to my net? I don't know the history of
> this box...
> 
Last time I tried booting up an old PC system into which I had
installed a power supply that had been sitting on a shelf for more than
a couple of years, it worked until it was half way through doing the
updates of a fresh Ubuntu install, then there was a fairly loud bang as
a capacitor or something blew up inside the power supply and took the
house ring main down with it! I've also seen very expensive laboratory
equipment do the same after sitting on a shelf for a couple of years,
so I'd be tempted to first replace the power supply in the old system
with a new or recently used one. Maybe if you're concerned, take out
the HDD too and put something clean on. If you need something 32 bit
there are mint distributions to suit.

Dave