Floppy Disks vs. USB Drives
 

   Floppy Disk Pros

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   Floppy Disk Cons

• Small capacity, so you can't put many files on them.
• Very slow to read/write files.
• Prone to wear and tear, resulting in unreadable files.
• Prone to incompatibles between different computers (i.e. - disks won't read).
• Some newer computers don't have floppy drives.

   USB Drive Pros

• Come in a variety capacities, but even a low capacity USB drive can store many more files than a floppy disk.
• Very fast to access files, more comparable in speed to a hard drive.
• No moving/exposed parts and therefore much more reliable than a floppy disk.
• Can be thrown in your pocket or purse without fear of damage.
• You can fit multiple student files, large projects, and your own course materials on one USB key.
• Automatically works on any Windows XP or Windows 2000 computer with a USB port.

   USB Drive Cons

• Initial cost is more expensive than a box of floppies.

• Are often easily forgotten in the USB port.

A typical 3.5
floppy disk. Can store up to 1.4 megabytes
of information.

USB drives are
usually about the size of your pinky finger. USB drives come in capacities from anywhere to
16 megabytes to 4000 megabytes.

How to use a USB drive on a Windows XP computer

Insert the USB drive into the computer's (or notebook's) USB port. The USB port looks like a
little rectangular connector found usually on
the front or back of the computer.

Upon plugging the USB drive into the computer, Windows will immediately detect the USB drive
and inform you with a message...

... the computer will then take a take a few
seconds to automatically set things up for you.

To use the drive, you can treat the USB drive like
any other disk in your computer.

Note: The removable disk may be assigned a
different drive letter depending on the computer
it's plugged into. It doesn't matter if it's a different
letter on your home or school computer. The drive
letter is only used as a way of identifying the drive
to the computer it's currently connected to.

When you are done using the USB drive, you
should save your work and close all your programs.

You should then ALWAYS "safely eject" the USB
drive by right clicking on the drive in My Computer
and choosing "eject" from the menu.

Note: If you physically pull the drive out of the
computer's USB port without "safely ejecting" it
first, you may lose files or even damage the
electronics of the USB drive.

If Windows won't allow you to safely eject the
drive, close all open programs.

If you still can't eject the drive, reboot the computer
and try ejecting it again. Or, shutdown the computer
and remove the drive when the power is off. Only as
a very last resort should you physically pull the drive
out of the computer without "safely ejecting" it first

If you see this message, it is now safe to
remove the USB drive by physically pulling it out
of the computer.

A word of caution: Do not rely on your USB drive
as your sole back-up of information. They can
stop working and as with all files, you should
have a back-up of your files - just in case!

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