[mdlug] External Floppy Drive

[Peter Bart]

On Mon, 2009-02-23 at 21:30 -0500, Michael Rudas wrote:
> --- Peter Bart wrote:
> 
> > I'm in need of an external floppy drive; and taking Rays advice on not
> > letting the drive suck power from USB; I went looking. Just quickly
> > looking in a few places, all seem to be powered via USB. Is this because
> > the power requirements are not as large a hard drive and could safely be
> > powered by the USB port, or should I seriously go looking? I would be
> > using this at home, so power availability is not an issue.
> 
> Basically, ALL USB-external floppy drives are port-powered--I've never
> seen one with external power--the power requirements of a 3.5-inch
> floppy drive are less than the 2.5 watts (5V at 500mA) that a USB port
> can source.  As Aaron pointed out, a powered hub would reduce draw
> from the PC--in fact, a USB 1.1 hub is fast enough (floppy drives are
> SLOW)--and you might even have one around the house...
> 

	I thought that might be the case. I was able to dig up the power
consumption of a Lacie external floppy, but nothing to compare it to.
Such as the hard drives Ray was talking about. You're right, I have
several Belkin powered usb hubs around, not sure if they're 1.1 or more
recent. As you point out it's moot anyway. Thanks for weighing in. I've
got one on order
<http://stores.channeladvisor.com/LenovoOutlet/Items/ca05k9276?sck=8972224&caSKU=ca05k9276&caTitle=ThinkPlus%20USB%20Portable%20Diskette%20Drive>. 
	I was wondering about a usb/serial adapter, you might know the answer?
If I plug the floppy into the powered usb hub, then use a usb to serial
adapter to get to a computer w/o a usb port, would that work? Just idly
curious.

Best Regards,
-- 
Peter Bart <peter at petertheplumber.net>
Peter The Plumber