Are floppy disks safe to store wallets?

[thejaytiesto]

I was doing some cleaning on my room and I found some floppy disks, they are around 15 years old! from the Sony brand. I don't have a floppy disk device anymore on my computer, so I used an older computer because I was curious to see if they would still work.
To my surprise, they worked and all the files were accessible.

This made me think that, you could store some Bitcoin related stuff in floppy disks too? Obviously having backups in other places too.. but floppy disks may be yet another cheap way to store files. If I put my seed key in a txt (compressed in a 7z file with a pass) and my wallet.dat file on that floppy disk, it would have lasted for 15 years. I hope that if I do this, in the next 15 years when I find the floppy disks again, I will be rich

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[cryptoheadd]

Haha.
I'd never recommend you to store your wallet.dat files on a floppy disk.
If you're planning to store it for a long term, Floppy disk readers would be an antique in the near future.

[venan]

but after 15 years, i am sure you willnot be able to find any devise where you can put this floppy disk to start, so they would be usless.

take some mini disk and write your wallet.dat and txt file there and put this disk in the safe place. this will be better option

[The Sceptical Chymist]

I wouldn't,  only because I don't know how durable they are in the long term.   And we're already in the long term as far as they're concerned.   No one would probably think to steal a floppy, though.

[thejaytiesto]

but after 15 years, i am sure you willnot be able to find any devise where you can put this floppy disk to start, so they would be usless.

take some mini disk and write your wallet.dat and txt file there and put this disk in the safe place. this will be better option

I think it will be easy to find readers. There are a lot of retro stuff, you can buy a floppy disk reader that can be connected through USB... there will always be a niche market of people that need to access old data. If the ones I have now break (I doubt it because at the end of the day it's pretty simple and mechanical stuff) it should not be hard to find some reader out there.

Also the idea is that I have a bunch of floppy disks. So If I have a box with like 50 floppy disks, and I put wallet files on all 50 floppy disks, it means that I have 50+ extra different points of failure for free. I think it's very unlikely that 50 floppy disks will die in 15 years, im sure at least 1 will survive

[bri912678]

but after 15 years, i am sure you willnot be able to find any devise where you can put this floppy disk to start, so they would be usless.

take some mini disk and write your wallet.dat and txt file there and put this disk in the safe place. this will be better option

You can still buy external floppy disk drives that plug into your usb port. This one only costs $13.99

http://www.amazon.com/Sabrent-External-Floppy-Drive-FL-UDRV/dp/B00E9MD700/


It might last 15 years if you don't use it much. Nevertheless I wouldn't trust a floppy disk to store a wallet safely for a long time. I'd back up a wallet in triplicate on a cd, dvd, and a thumb drive. Floppy disks are from the stone age.

[btc-facebook]

I thought if you store into floppy disk will not support bitcoin.
But if they actually work, it may be another optional place for you to store more. Just make sure that your floppy disk has safety package

[cryptoheadd]

Obviously having backups in other places too..

I guess it would be a great experiment.
You can store the Bitcoins on the floppy disk (with safer backups). It would be great to see if the floppy disk still works after 15 years.

[NeuroticFish]

I was doing some cleaning on my room and I found some floppy disks, they are around 15 years old! from the Sony brand. I don't have a floppy disk device anymore on my computer, so I used an older computer because I was curious to see if they would still work.
To my surprise, they worked and all the files were accessible.

This made me think that, you could store some Bitcoin related stuff in floppy disks too? Obviously having backups in other places too.. but floppy disks may be yet another cheap way to store files. If I put my seed key in a txt (compressed in a 7z file with a pass) and my wallet.dat file on that floppy disk, it would have lasted for 15 years. I hope that if I do this, in the next 15 years when I find the floppy disks again, I will be rich

If you ever used fdd, you know that there's always a risk a bad sector develops where you don't expect and the subsequent file will get damaged.

Also, since they use magnetic surface to store data, I am amazed your data is still readable. Most of the cases that doesn't happen after 15 yr.

All in all no, your fdds are already something way better/unexpected than an average fdd. Your experiment would prove nothing, whether it'll be succesful or not (not mentioning the lack of fdd drives nowadays).

[RoommateAgreement]

it is strange that those disks are still working for you!

because i had a couple of Floppy disks with the same age over 15 years and when i tested them recently they failed to even open.

but it is a good place to store only if it is not the only place, and you back up in something else like paper too.

[thejaytiesto]

I was doing some cleaning on my room and I found some floppy disks, they are around 15 years old! from the Sony brand. I don't have a floppy disk device anymore on my computer, so I used an older computer because I was curious to see if they would still work.
To my surprise, they worked and all the files were accessible.

This made me think that, you could store some Bitcoin related stuff in floppy disks too? Obviously having backups in other places too.. but floppy disks may be yet another cheap way to store files. If I put my seed key in a txt (compressed in a 7z file with a pass) and my wallet.dat file on that floppy disk, it would have lasted for 15 years. I hope that if I do this, in the next 15 years when I find the floppy disks again, I will be rich

If you ever used fdd, you know that there's always a risk a bad sector develops where you don't expect and the subsequent file will get damaged.

Also, since they use magnetic surface to store data, I am amazed your data is still readable. Most of the cases that doesn't happen after 15 yr.

All in all no, your fdds are already something way better/unexpected than an average fdd. Your experiment would prove nothing, whether it'll be succesful or not (not mentioning the lack of fdd drives nowadays).

Maybe it depends on the brand. I tried some other that aren't Sony, they are some other unknown random brand, and some have corrupted files, but the Sony ones seem to be working, also some IBM ones still working fine, some other don't even show up, they make a noise but it doesn't show up anything on the files explorer, it asks me to enter a disk with the disk inside, so those are definitely dead, but most work.

[The Arcitect]

There isn't enough storage capacity on those any ways. What were they 1.44 megabytes?
That is small amount of space to store anything nowadays.
You remember dat drives or zip disks? Those might be more of a capacity you would be looking at.

[Holliday]

No.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_degradation

[thejaytiesto]

No.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_degradation

I know the odds are against me for my floppy disks being intact in another 15 years, but I will still do it, I mean what I have to lose? Im sure a lot of people has also think of this and is already storing their wallets everywhere possible, including old floppy disks. The more different points of failure you have, the better. I actually think floppy's are safer than usb pendrives.

[Abdussamad]

No because floppies are notoriously unreliable. You just got lucky with those particular disks.

[onlinedragon]

Floppy disks are extremely fragile and are often destroyed even when you treat them with care. That is also one of the big reasons why they are not used anymore in modern computers. Also don't see the point to use outdated floppies when there are more good options available.

[LiteCoinGuy]

better use a M-Disc.

[amacar2]

Good to hear that floppy disk can long last for several years but storing bitcoin wallet backup in them will be disaster if we can't find floppy drive reader in future. And if you say you will also keep that old computer with you than your old computer may get damaged by years and also that floppy reading device in it. Its always better to store papper wallet in some safe places.

[lite]

Just do it if you really want to do it, but also make a backup in usb drive just in case floppy disks fail. 

[socks435]

Just do it if you really want to do it, but also make a backup in usb drive just in case floppy disks fail.  

I think this is not a good idea if we use floppy disks as our store wallets.. its very slow process if you use floppy disk as your wallet.. but you can try this too.. and i heard here in our forum also usb and memory cards is not recommended too because if you dont use it in many months or years the files wil be corrupted or usb won't work because i have lots of usb here in few months my usb didnt work anymore.. but if you use it every its work fine..  also memory card i have lots of mmc but all of them are not work.. mmc cant live in long time..
If you really want to store bitcoins safe try to use vps and install win 7 and install virtual box that can install os again.. and install your wallet their just store bitcoin in offline mode..also making a scrypted rar file can help to safe your bitcoins..