Floppy drive grows legs to avoid spills, still can't avoid extinction
By Donald Melanson 
posted July 20th 2010 1:52PM
posted July 20th 2010 1:52PM
We might one day live in a world where everyday electronics can fend for themselves against household disasters but, for the time being, we can only marvel at one of a kind projects like this "Floppy Legs" drive from British design team Chambers Judd. As you can probably surmise, they've added some legs to an otherwise ordinary external floppy drive, which remain concealed most of the time, but spring to life if there's liquid spilled near the drive. Head on past the break to see that amazing feat for yourself, and be sure to take a peek at some of the team's earlier projects as well, including the Gesundheit Radio that "sneezes" to clear away dust.
OMG I WANT 1
so the spill cant fall on top of the floppy drive?
@Dsi2play
Then it will just jump and roll-over
That is pretty awesome. From now on everything should have legs like that.
Lol, I was going to put some type of innuendo concerning your girlfriend, legs springing out and fluid but I decided not to.
@BlackedOut
well of course blow up dolls have flexible legs. durrr.
Next up, optical disc drive legs!
I suspect it'll need quite a bit more R&D...
Ooooh 5 1/4 inch, reminds me of the good old BBC Micro.
Baller~
I miss floppy drives.......
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felt legit bringing my typed homework to school in like 3rd grade, everyone else wrote theirs, hah!
how whimsical and useless!
could we get this in a laptop?
Floppy drives haven't got a leg to stand on.
Except this one.
I had my hopes on the zip drive...could never figure out why no one liked them. Tons of space, easy to add data, and hardly larger than a floppy. It was really tough too add data to cd's when they first came out. No drag and drop
@dswatson83 *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click* *click*
Shit.
@CurGeorge8
reliability and price = zip drive fail. at university we could buy 1 zip disk for $10 or approximately 40 CDs for the same price. zip discs would fail left and right, but the CDs were so cheap (and reliable) that you used them and then watched them create lightning storms in the microwave before tossing them out.
@willowtwf
This is true, I can will admit to using the Click of Death to get myself out of missing assignment deadlines. Most of my prof's required us to turn in projects on a zip disk. So I would keep one or two dead disks around, and if I was ever late on an assignment, I would just turn in a dead disk.
This would always buy me 2-3 more days, and sometimes an apology from my professor. Brilliant.
@CurGeorge8 That is devious.
@dswatson83
Did Iomega allow 3rd party hardware manufacturers to sell drives? From my recollection, I can't remember a ZIP drive not manufactured by Iomega. If it is indeed true that they didn't license the technology to other companies, that could explain a lot. Same reason why MiniDiscs never caught on.
@dswatson83
I had many Zip discs. Too many. Even in that era 100MB was too small. I went on to use a Jaz drive instead. Now I use hard drives, they are just as removeable as anything else and way faster.
@dswatson83
I don't know about you guys, but I am still storing my info on cassette tapes.
@CurGeorge8 That's actually quite evil - a clicking Zip disk usually ripped the heads out of the Zip drive... and with the heads ripped out, they usually caught on the media, ripping it, causing it to grab the heads in the next Zip drive.
way to support a dead art
just kidding, i still love ZIP drives and 8 tracks...and I just saved a few docs to my floppy the other day
@CooterLightman
I'm with you 100%.
I fail to see why people discount old technology as soon as its old.
Just because there's something new, doesn't mean the new thing is always the most appropriate.
@FORDY
What is next for you guys ? A fax machine?
@FORDY
Well, in the case of the floppy and zip disks, they really are no match to pen drives in terms of size, capacity and performance.
@mannyengadget i have å fax at mørk, I nede it før domain name registration :(
WANT.
I still use floppys ...Still own 3 Sony Mavica Cameras...One of the most dependable ( yet Giant) digital cameras i have owned. Anyone else have one of these beasts?
@Fizzy This would greatly accompany all those floppys
@Fizzy Mavica! I gave my old one (1.3 mp woohoo) to my 8 year-old daughter and she loves it. I have like 6 floppies full of pics she has been taking with it.
And if she can't destroy it, no one can!
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@bj55555
Can't include angle brackets in a post? Seriously, Engadget?
@bj55555
Whole heap of fail up there ^^^
@bj55555
Sure you can. You just need to know the <magical incantation>.
OMG... Can't wait for Zip drive with legs!
Not that I like the evo that much, but it has a kickstand that could...if you spilled.....just sayin
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@bj55555
Aha, so true.
This is just the first step in the a series of many to kill John Connor.
Did this come from some sort of bizzaro universe where they still use floppy drives?
@helmsb In Communist Russia, floppy drive use you.
@CurGeorge8
Fail.
It should also make insect like sounds. That would be so win.
I'm still looking for a wireless floppy drive. 8" preferably.
@huh My old Apple II disc drives would make all sorts of buzzing sounds, maybe you could coax this one to do that =)
it's just a floppy drive, they don't do much
@jul
yeah they do, they play fucking floppy disks
@Psyclotr0n
I couldn't help it. I burst out laughing.
Serious? When I saw this,I thought it was an addition to the Computer Museum along with Mac Classic II and MacPaint!