DOS Games Discussion

-Thermaltake Xaser III Skull case (black)
-Thermaltake Butterfly 480watt PSU

-Asus K8V SE Deluxe mobo
-AMD 64 3000+ (2ghz, 512mb cache)
-2 256mb sticks of OCZ DDR400 RAM
-WinXP Home

===on to the crap stuff===

I kinda ran out of money so I threw in the parts from my PII machine to see if I could get my AMD system to POST.

-1 6gig FUJI HDD
-1 2gig Quantim HDD
-1 Mouse w/ left button smashed off and bad prescision...
-1 ghetto keyboard from 1995...
-1 LG combo drive (unsure of read and RW speeds, but it's a 12x burner)

===What I plan on getting in one or two weeks===

-1 Optical (cordless?) mouse
-1 Ideazon iBoard
-1 (maybe 2... depending on price) 200gig drives
-if too much, 2 160 gig drives
-1 LG 8x DVD-RW
-1 Mitsumi Floppy drive w/ media card reader
-Neon


-Richard-

Dont get cordless. They tend to be heavier than normal mice. Horrible for any kind of gaming. Even web surfing is a drag.

t'was what I thought. Not only to mention the loss of signal problems that occour. Apparently they're good on batteries tho.

There's no reason whatsoever I can think of to get a cordless mouse, but optical is a must-have. I've had the same optical for 3 years and it still works perfectly.

the mouse WILL be optical. No doubt about it. I really wasn't planning on getting cordless. It was just a random thought, if for some crazy reason I DO decide to go cordless, it'll probably be a Logitech one. Otherwise I really don't care what brand of mouse I get.


-Richard-

Oh yea, I forgot about the videocard: ATI Radeon 9200se 128mb 8xAGP. Not too bad. Will be hopefully upgrading to asus 9600xt, or ATI 9800XT AIW.

-Richard-

Since when do we use floppy disks in new machines anymore? Well agree with old games but you could put them on a memory stick or somthing?

1) Use it for school... I'm not going to waste a 700mb CD for a 512k document
2) I'll get one w/ a card reader in it.


-Richard-

About the floppy...What if your comp messes up and you don't have a bootcd or it won't work? I guess you'll kick the comp and expect it to boot up...

Personally, I find floppy disks more convenient that CD burning when it comes to small files. Also, floppy drives are more natively supported than CD-ROM/CD burners. Oh yeah, and the legacy A: drive allocation, leave that out and you end up with a void of sorts.

No, a floppy drive is not essential but it is excellent to have one, even in next year's new computers. Oh yeah, and floppy disks are more efficient and faster when it comes to small files. CD burning needs header and trailer data to allow multisession writing (a few megabytes in addition to the file). As well, it's easier to use a floppy drive, less clicking involved.

File copying:

Floppy: Right click >> Send to >> A: >> Wait about 5 to 30 sec >> Remove floppy

CD: Right click >> Send to >> CD burner >> Double click on My Computer >> Right click on CD burner >> Write files to CD >> Enter volume label >> Wait about 1 to 5 minutes >> Remove CD

And having a floppy drive adds fault tolerance (If CD drive breaks down, use floppy. If floppy drive breaks down, use CD)

Also if you want 4 hard drives, floppy is your main removable media. And the floppy drive has a special wire and a special ribbon on the motherboard.

Or how about if someone is ditching their old 486 for a new Pentium 4 and they own 300 floppy disks. Isn't it convenient to be able to use those right away? Also what a waste of plastic and metal if people threw out their old blank floppies because their new computer didn't come with a new floppy drive.

There you go, I see that the best way is to keep the floppy drive in new computers.

I see..
But floppys sometimes tend to stuff up..
like i had heaps of school work on 1 disk. and then it crashed said this disk needs formatting
I still use them but on very rare occasions

There is a way to do Direct Cd writing (deleting and copying back onto normal cd-r's)
Multisessioning is another story

Yeah they are very fragile and need to be taken care of. Nonetheless, there's really no need to sell new computers without floppy drives.

Ok, I had a nice long post, but the maintenance shut down as I was posting and ruined it, so heres a quicky.

1) 4 Hard drives, and 3 CD-Devices with 2 Floppies is perfectly fine. All you need is a cheap IDE contoller, and some sound cards even have one on them.

2) You cant re-write CD-R's wally, only CD-RW's.

I have seen it done kazer 0
Using a program called Direct CD but it is only compatable with Direct-CD program..

Well, it's a fake rewrite/delete. The files are still there, but you can't access them.

I used Adaptec DirectCD and the floppy disk is still way easier and simpler when dealing with small files.

but you cant see it either

Of course not. Isn't CDFS wonderful? The "deleted" files remain as useless invisible masses of ones and zeros.

CDFS = Compact Disc File System

fair enough

And even though you can't see it, it's still taking up the same amount of space. Unless you're trying to hide pornos on it or shit it's a terrific way to waste time, money, and a CD-rom.

Being a student, I personally use floppy disks on a almost daily basis. I've transported literally hundreds of assignments to school and back and couldn't do without it. Reasons:

#1
Floppy disks are much more compact, and are good for individual assignments. After I'm done with it I put a label on it with the name of the assignment and the grade I got, and then store it in my completed homework bin. It's a lot more convenient (and safer) than storing paper assignments, not to mention it'll help tremendously when applying for college next year.

#2
The schools read/write programming is different than my computers, and it'll be even more so in 10 years. Floppy disks are a universal medium.

#3
There’s no way I'm going to be using 720 megs on a 50 KB assignment. I could use the CD for better purposes-like music or game storage. (I actually have about 10 CDs full of games I've downloaded but keep off my computer for space and usability reasons)

what about USB memory keys?