3.5" External Floppy Diskette USB Drive - 1.44 MB FDD Portable Plug and Play for Laptops, Desktops, and Notebooks (Black)

If, like me, you have a bunch of old 3.5 floppy disks laying around, but no computer any more that sports a drive, this is a huge remedy. It really doesn't get any easier that this to use. Plug it in to a USB port, insert a disk, retrieve the contents. It is a bit of a slow process compared to today's standards, but the ability to retrieve material you once though was gone for good, more than makes up for the copying delay. I have been able to retrieve pictures from the 80's and 90's that I have not seen since that time. If you have some of these laying around, I recommend this option as opposed to services that may charge way more and take a good deal of time. Not to mention the potential of your mail going missing.

This Floppy 3.5 USB 3.0 External Floppy Disk Drive (Plug and Play) was a Teac Model No. FD-05PUB before Mougerk took it over, using the same Model No., and updated it to conform with our modern day computers and Operating Systems (OS). The printing on the box states that the Floppy Disk Drive comes with a CD-ROM containing a driver (or drivers?) and a User’s Guide. Not true! The box contained only the Floppy Disk Drive. I have three PCs with Windows OS installed. They are as follows: one Desktop running Windows XP, one Desktop running Windows 7 and one Laptop running Windows 8.1. I am happy to say that, yes the Floppy Drive is ”Plug and Play”, yes it is USB 3.0 and yes this External Floppy Drive works great with all three of my computers and their installed OS. I liked it so well I bought another one. New? I don’t think so. Updated? I believe so. Watch out for the Internet because so many of these External Floppy Disk Drives need the CD-ROM containing the drivers. The driver update companies are cashing in on this problem.

This drive arrived quickly and in good shape. The first time I attempted to plug it into the USB port it shorted out some pins and forced a PC reset. This was probably my fault so no blame there. On my next attempt I did get it plugged in okay and the computer recognized drive_A. But when I tried to read a disc the green process bar started moving slowly and it took several minutes to get to the point where it asked me to insert a disc in drive A. There was already a disc in there so I removed it and put it in again. Nothing. I tried a few more times, and at one point it actually did show some files on the drive. I had been using a USB port in the front of the computer, but those might not deliver enough power, so I moved it to one in the back, which is directly wired into the PCB. The green light on the drive comes on either way but overall, it turned out to be a waste of money and time. I blame Windows 10 and not the drive. The new technology is just not backward compatible. So now I still have a stack of old 3.5" floppies and I can't tell what's on them, if anything. I don't want to just pitch them out and I am reluctant to destroy them, since they may have some interesting content.Update 1/10/2020: I took my drive and stack of 3.5" floppies to a neighbor. We plugged the drive into his laptop and it was able to read several of the discs. He had an old PC running Windows7 and we were able to read most of the discs. I copied the content onto a flash drive for future use. Seeing that the drive worked with his laptop I brought it back home and tried it again with a disc we were able to read on his computer. No luck. So there is something going on that keeps this drive from working with my desktop PC. At least I recovered everything I wanted off the old floppies, and I can now destroy them. For anyone considering buying this drive, you may or may not be able to use it with your Windows10 computer.

I received a working 3.5 inch floppy drive on the day promised for delivery (I live in a small city). Mougerk emailed me a set of instructions for use of this drive before the drive arrived. I used Windows 7 on both a desktop and and a laptop, and I was able to read all types of 3.5 inch floppies I had. The drive is also able to write and format disks. I cannot vouch for longevity of this drive yet.The drive does not function like the old built-in drives we remember. You cannot go from disk-to-disk viewing contents. Plug into USB and wait for software to load and make sure drive has stopped making noises. Then you can check through Windows Explorer to make sure the drive is recognized or insert floppy first. I have to remove the disk and close Explorer before working with the next floppy disk. (You just leave the drive plugged in until you are finished with it.) Any troubles might be a bad disk or no program that can read the disk, but can be other reasons.

First time I connected it to my laptop (running Windows 10), it found the drive and assigned a letter in windows explorer. When I put in a disc (and then several after that), it tried to read it (well the drive made noise), but then it said "The disk media is not recognized. It may not be formatted." Then, the drive disappears from the list in windows explorer. I unplugged it, plugged it back in; however, it took several attempts to get the drive to show up again.As I mentioned, none of my disks (from the late 90s, early 2000s) were readable.Such a disappointment, since I saw the product rating, and it arrived the day after I ordered. Will be returning it.

I needed a 3.5" disk drive to transfer files from my modern PC to my 1980's vintage PC. It works as expexted as long as you plug it into your PC before turning the PC on. If you plug it into the USB port on your PC while the PC has already started, the PC will not see the disk drive.

I bought this to try and read some old floppy disks, but this drive is constantly trying to read disks that aren't there, I don't know if it's a windows 11 thing or what. I wind up unplugging it so it's not constantly making noise trying to read diskettes that aren't there.

Since this is 'old' technology, I wasn't expecting the great and instant response when I plugged it into my current laptop. I was pleasantly surprised, and am using it to get pix that I storred on the floppies a LONG time ago.