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I forget. Did they remove the little plastic square thing to make it read-only? For youngins, 3.5" floppies had a "write protect" switch. If it was a solid pla

I forget. Did they remove the little plastic square thing to make it read-only? For youngins, 3.5" floppies had a "write protect" switch. If it was a solid plastic bit, you could write, but if the switch showed a hole, it would be treated as read only. Here's the first Google result I found: https://electronicstechnician.tpub.com/14091/css/Write-Protect-Write-Enable-Slide-262.htm https://electronicstechnician.tpub.com/14091/css/Write-Prote...

classichasclass 4y ago
None of the ones I got ever did. They were immediately repurposed (along with all those free Computer City floppies). Reusing the CDs was a little harder. ;)
- nirav72 4y ago
  AOL CDs made great coasters.
notadev 4y ago
You could just cover the hole with a piece of scotch tape and voila, writeable!
- asveikau 4y ago
  Scotch tape, huh? I would have figured electrical tape, for opacity. I don't think I ever had to do this though.
  - command_tab 4y ago
    All the floppy drives I've ever seen had a little mechanical arm attached to a microswitch that detected the presence or absence of the write protect notch. VHS cassettes worked similarly.
    - SoftTalker 4y ago
      Audio cassettes had this also. A little tab you could break off that would prevent recording. If you later changed your mind and wanted to record over the tape, you would just tape over the hole.
  - dizhn 4y ago
    No need. It was just pushing something inside the drive. A little piece of paper jammed in the hole worked fine too. You also drilled a hole on the other side to make the disk double density.
InvaderFizz 4y ago
I'm not 100% sure I remember correctly, but I believe the AOL disks were standard in every way except that they never inserted the plastic slider. A bit of tape fixed that problem. Scotch tape worked fine, as pointed out by another poster. I typically just used a portion on an unused floppy label and wrapped it around the edge. I wasn't much concerned with write protection usually, so keeping it permanently writable was fine by me.

classichasclass 4y ago

None of the ones I got ever did. They were immediately repurposed (along with all those free Computer City floppies). Reusing the CDs was a little harder. ;)

nirav72 4y ago
AOL CDs made great coasters.

notadev 4y ago

You could just cover the hole with a piece of scotch tape and voila, writeable!

asveikau 4y ago
Scotch tape, huh? I would have figured electrical tape, for opacity. I don't think I ever had to do this though.
- command_tab 4y ago
  All the floppy drives I've ever seen had a little mechanical arm attached to a microswitch that detected the presence or absence of the write protect notch. VHS cassettes worked similarly.
  - SoftTalker 4y ago
    Audio cassettes had this also. A little tab you could break off that would prevent recording. If you later changed your mind and wanted to record over the tape, you would just tape over the hole.
- dizhn 4y ago
  No need. It was just pushing something inside the drive. A little piece of paper jammed in the hole worked fine too. You also drilled a hole on the other side to make the disk double density.

InvaderFizz 4y ago

I'm not 100% sure I remember correctly, but I believe the AOL disks were standard in every way except that they never inserted the plastic slider. A bit of tape fixed that problem. Scotch tape worked fine, as pointed out by another poster. I typically just used a portion on an unused floppy label and wrapped it around the edge. I wasn't much concerned with write protection usually, so keeping it permanently writable was fine by me.