disketter

Disketter, or floppy disks, are removable magnetic storage media enclosed in a plastic shell. They store data on a thin, flexible magnetic disk that spins inside the case and is accessed by a read/write head in a drive. Disketter were produced in several sizes, with the most common being the 8-inch, 5.25-inch, and 3.5-inch formats.

The 8-inch disks were introduced in the 1960s for mainframes and remained in use in specialized equipment for several years. The 5.25-inch format became widespread in personal computers during the late 1970s and 1980s, while the 3.5-inch diskette, protected by a hard shell and a sliding shutter, became dominant in the late 1980s and 1990s.

Capacities depended on size and density. Early 5.25-inch disks offered a few hundred kilobytes per side; later double-density and high-density variants increased capacity. The standard 3.5-inch high-density disk held about 1.44 MB of data, and there were other densities and capacities less common at the time.

Disketter were used for software distribution, data backups, and inter-computer transfer. They were sensitive to magnetic fields, heat, dust, and mechanical damage, and their data longevity deteriorated with time.

The adoption of optical discs, USB flash drives, and larger hard disks led to a rapid decline in floppy use from the 1990s onward. Today disketter are mainly of historical interest or used for maintenance of legacy systems; some modern systems preserve floppy support via emulation or external drives.