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When I was 17 I remember having my mind blown that you could use a hole punch to double the storage space on your existing media. In a way, these type of hardwa

When I was 17 I remember having my mind blown that you could use a hole punch to double the storage space on your existing media. In a way, these type of hardware hacks put you more in touch with the devices you were using. Day-before-yesterday I put a memory card in the DVD slot on my iMac. I have no clue how I'm going to get it out, other than taking apart my computer. Or leaving it there, given I don't use DVDs anymore.

therealidiot 11y ago
I once absentmindedly put one of those small CDs into a slot drive in a laptop... Taking the laptop wasn't a problem, but taking the slot drive apart? It makes me sad that everything is built to keep you out of your devices.
- listic 11y ago
  Slot drives cannot handle mini CD's? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini_CD https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini_CD
  - eli 11y ago
    It's right in your wikipedia link "Most slot-loading CD drives are generally incompatible..."
- Dylan16807 11y ago
  Making things compact and precise is hard. A full sized disc drive is only a moment of screwing to open up. This non-slot laptop drive I have seems to be easy to disassemble too.
weinzierl 11y ago
There were purpose built 5.25" diskette punches. I still have one. For those who don't know how such a contraption looks, Wikipedia has at least an image [1], but no article in English unfortunately. [1] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Diskette#/media/File:Diskettenlocher.jpg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Diskette#/media/File:Disk...
- userbinator 11y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Floppy_disk_variants#Flippy_disks https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Floppy_disk_varia...
tracker1 11y ago
yeah... I remember buying higher quality disks, that were marked for lower density and single sided (forget the brand) and discovering that you could punch and format double sided, double density without issue... jackpot! It would have been hard to imagine these days having a stack of thumb drives and digging for one at least 8gb, and thinking, when I saw the 512mb-2gb ones of just tossing them away.
- rasz_pl 11y ago
  closest thing today that I can think of is buying one of those fake chinese 128GB USB drives on ebay/alibaba, running h2testw to determine its really 8GB, making a screenshot and starting a refund claim - bam a free 8GB usb drive.
thought_alarm 11y ago
Use a thin L-shaped piece of cardboard to fish it out. I used the top flap of a cereal box, folded in half. The tab on the flap was big enough to hook onto the SD card.

therealidiot 11y ago

I once absentmindedly put one of those small CDs into a slot drive in a laptop... Taking the laptop wasn't a problem, but taking the slot drive apart? It makes me sad that everything is built to keep you out of your devices.

listic 11y ago
Slot drives cannot handle mini CD's? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini_CD https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini_CD
- eli 11y ago
  It's right in your wikipedia link "Most slot-loading CD drives are generally incompatible..."
Dylan16807 11y ago
Making things compact and precise is hard. A full sized disc drive is only a moment of screwing to open up. This non-slot laptop drive I have seems to be easy to disassemble too.

weinzierl 11y ago

There were purpose built 5.25" diskette punches. I still have one. For those who don't know how such a contraption looks, Wikipedia has at least an image [1], but no article in English unfortunately. [1] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Diskette#/media/File:Diskettenlocher.jpg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Diskette#/media/File:Disk...

userbinator 11y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Floppy_disk_variants#Flippy_disks https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Floppy_disk_varia...

tracker1 11y ago

yeah... I remember buying higher quality disks, that were marked for lower density and single sided (forget the brand) and discovering that you could punch and format double sided, double density without issue... jackpot! It would have been hard to imagine these days having a stack of thumb drives and digging for one at least 8gb, and thinking, when I saw the 512mb-2gb ones of just tossing them away.

rasz_pl 11y ago
closest thing today that I can think of is buying one of those fake chinese 128GB USB drives on ebay/alibaba, running h2testw to determine its really 8GB, making a screenshot and starting a refund claim - bam a free 8GB usb drive.

thought_alarm 11y ago

Use a thin L-shaped piece of cardboard to fish it out. I used the top flap of a cereal box, folded in half. The tab on the flap was big enough to hook onto the SD card.