Transferring data from a floppy drive to a laptop

[torinsmom]

I found some older floppy disks from 10-15 years ago. Some of them have pictures of my son when he was young and others.....well, who knows what is on them? Anyway, how would I go about getting that info off the disks? I have a floppy disk drive that is made for my laptop, but it is not installed(the CD drive is) Is there a way to attach this floppy drive to my laptop so I can get the data off or at least see what's there?

 

[crazelion]

I found some older floppy disks from 10-15 years ago. Some of them have pictures of my son when he was young and others.....well, who knows what is on them? Anyway, how would I go about getting that info off the disks? I have a floppy disk drive that is made for my laptop, but it is not installed(the CD drive is) Is there a way to attach this floppy drive to my laptop so I can get the data off or at least see what's there?

See if the floppy drive can be hook up to a usb port or fire port.

 

[torinsmom]

The drive doesn't have a USB port. It has a longish port on the opposite end from where you would put the floppy.

 

[bdcp]

You need to know what formats you are dealing with and if they are compatible with what you have on your laptop. You might have to have it done professionally if you can't do it yourself. There's all kinds of issues with 10+ year old data and images.

You'll probably need an adapter to connect the drive to the laptop. I'm pretty positive you won't have USB on the floppy drive.

 

[FireDancer]

I've never seen an FDD to USB converter so you probably can't get the drive you have to connect to the laptop. You can get a USB floppy drive like this one and it will let you drag files off of the disk onto you computer

 

[moray26]

It depends on whether the longish port on the floppy drive is a parallel port or a serial port. If it's serial, Radio Shack sells a serial to USB cable that would do the trick.

 

[torinsmom]

I'll check to see if anyone I know has one of those drives. I hate to buy one if I don't have to. Thanks!

 

[ndelaware]

I found some older floppy disks from 10-15 years ago. Some of them have pictures of my son when he was young and others.....well, who knows what is on them? Anyway, how would I go about getting that info off the disks? I have a floppy disk drive that is made for my laptop, but it is not installed(the CD drive is) Is there a way to attach this floppy drive to my laptop so I can get the data off or at least see what's there?

Normally you would remove the CD drive and slide the Floppy drive right in it's place.

I haven't seen a Floppy drive on a laptop for years but my wife's old work laptop had an removable Floppy drive.

 

[Imzadi]

Do you have the drivers to run the floppy disk drive?

Do you still have an old back up computer laying around, that has a floppy drive still in it? Then you can download the pics to that computer's hard drive and work from there. You might be able to simply email the pics from the floppy or hard drive.

Also try calling your local Kinkos/fedexOffice. They may still have a computer with a floppy drive and a USB port to rent. You could bring in a flash drive, connect it to the USB and transfer the pics off the floppy to the flash drive.

 

[torinsmom]

I don't have the software for the FDD. This is a work laptop and the FDD was just in the laptop bag when I got it.

Good idea about checking Kinko's! That would work and I could just save everything to my thumb drive. I am most interested in pictures, which should be JPEGs. I am thinking those would be viewable on my computer, although the quality will not be as good as today's.

 

[IronmansTinkerbell]

I Didn't Even Know They Still Made Floppy Disks...WOW

 

[RangerPooh]

Also check your local library to see if they have a floppy drive on their computers. My desktop at work has a floppy drive, why I have no idea , but I did find some old disks of mine from about 10 years ago that I'm curious about...Who knows I might find some old papers that are worth reading?

 

[torinsmom]

I Didn't Even Know They Still Made Floppy Disks...WOW

These are from 10-15 years ago when that was a very common storage medium. They are the hard kind, not the real floppy disks that are actually floppy.

 

[dzorn]

I think the photo computers at walmart have a 3 1/2 inch floppy drives.

Denise in MI

 

[momof1princess]

I've never seen an FDD to USB converter so you probably can't get the drive you have to connect to the laptop. You can get a USB floppy drive like this one and it will let you drag files off of the disk onto you computer

omg! THANK YOU! i had no idea these even existed, but i desperately need one! i have lots of old legal files on 3.5 inch floppys from 11+ years ago that i really don't want to lose, and the price for this external usb floppy drive is very reasonable.