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Raja Simhan T.E.

Is the floppy on the way out as products with higher storage capacity make their mark? eWorld tracks the scene.

TECHNOLOGY plays this game constantly - unveiling new products only to replace them with newer versions.

Take, for instance, the example of Allied Electronics and Magnetic Ltd. The company put on display its 8-inch and 5.25-inch floppy manufacturing machines at its Udaipur factory in Rajasthan. These machines had become obsolete after making way for the 3.5-inch floppy machine. But, how long before the 3.5-inch machine also becomes another `memento' for the company, which manufactures floppy diskettes, commonly known as floppies?

Change is inevitable, and quite fast, in the information technology scene. The 3.5-inch floppy disk drives that havebeen there for over a decade are slowly moving out of the scene, and making way for drives with higher data storage capacity. In an era of 10 gigabytes (GB) — a unit of computer memory or data storage capacity equal to 1,024 megabytes (MB) — power point presentations, the disappearance of the pocket-size disks is only a matter of time, say industry watchers.

Rajiv K. Bapna, Chief Executive of Allied Electronics that manufactures floppy disks under the brand name Amkette, says today customers want drives with higher storage capacity. The floppy drive is being replaced by a compact disk-recordable (CD-R) that can be used in a standard CD player in a computer. A related technology is CD-Rewritable (CD-RW) that allows one to erase disks and reuse them. A compact disk can hold 650 MB to 700 MB of data, compared to 1.44 MB in a floppy, he says.

The change is visible in Ritchie Street, Chennai's electronics hub. CD-Rs and CD-RWs are prominently displayed in shops, shadowing floppies. Consumers want CD-Rs rather than floppies, says a shopkeeper.

For over a decade, computer users have depended on 1.44 MB floppies to share files with others, to transport and transfer data to remote computers. Floppies have also been used for installing software and for backing-up critical files.

Today, however, floppies are too small and inadequate to back up the hard drives, and inadequate for distributing software. For instance, a simple power-point presentation with a few high-resolution images can fill several megabytes, making it impossible to store the entire presentation on a single floppy, says Bapna. As regards pricing, the cost of a floppy is in the Rs 10-12 range while that for a CD-R is Rs 13-15. A floppy's storage capacity is 1.44 MG compared to about 700 MB in a CD-R. The only difference between a floppy and a CD-R is that one can re-use the floppy but not the CD-R. The latter can only store data.

However, a CD-RW is reusable, and costs Rs 60-70. Bapna expects the cost of the CD-RW to come down by half in six months' time, making it more affordable. Further, CD-RW drives that cost over Rs 5,000 a year ago are available today at half the price. The price is set to come down further and the drive will be available for less than Rs 1,000 in a couple of years, he says.

How long before the 3.5-inch floppy disk drive is shown the door? Well, its phase-out might have once been thought unlikely. However, a year ago, the global personal computer manufacturer Dell announced the phasing out of 3.5-inch floppy disk drives in its popular Dimension desktop line. Some of the other manufacturers followed. "It is only a matter of time before the pocket-size floppies become nothing but pleasant, portable memories," says an official working with a leading personal computer manufacturing firm. Several companies, including Sony and Samsung, have entered the market to meet the demand for larger storage media, he says.

In 1981, IBM's personal computer debuted with the 5.25-inch floppy disk drive. The disks looked like smaller replicas of 8-inch disks. In the mid-eighties, the 3.5-inch floppy disk arrived. The recording material came in a hard plastic shell with a spring-loaded metal cover that slid sideways as one placed the disk into the drive. The floppies were safe and protected the data stored in it.

Today, there are different categories of large storage disks available in the market. At the low-end capacity segment are 100-150 MB capacity disks, which can store an entire software application and a power-point presentation. The second is 200-250 MB capacity disks while the third is the high-end category of 1 GB-2 GB capacities.

According to Bapna, other methods of storing data, including universal serial bus (USB), a new way of attaching devices to personal computers, are gaining popularity. Small and portable, the devices have become an increasingly popular replacement for floppy diskettes for transferring files between personal computers. USB devices are being used widely in overseas markets and slowly penetrating the Indian market, he says. The `mini' USB drives plug into any computer's USB port and allow applications to be conveniently launched and run directly from the mini drive. A 128 MB USB drive is equivalent to 88 floppy disks and can store over 100 digital photos. On a higher scale, a 1 GB USB drive is equivalent to 711 floppies and can store over 800 digital photos.

The global market for flash memory-based USB storage devices is expected to grow rapidly over the new few years, reaching $3.8 billion in revenue by 2006, according to a report by Semico Research some time ago.

Picture by Bijoy Ghosh

raja@thehindu.co.in

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