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Floppy disk

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Latest comment: 1 month ago36 comments4 people in discussion

Unless I'm missing something, while the lead mentions this connector is used for floppy disk drives, there doesn't appear to be any discussion of the actual floppy disc connector (which looks similar, but has fewer pins and also uses a different power connector (at least for 3.5" drives)). If there is an article already for that connector, we should probably link to it from here as they look very similar. —Locke Cole • t • c 17:27, 5 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

See Floppy disk drive interface, also linked to from Shugart bus. The original ST-506 interface was derived from the floppy interface, but PATA isn't. There were quite a lot of interfaces with ribbon connectors around back then. --Zac67 (talk) 18:15, 5 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
So is the lead accurate that the connection was used for floppy drives (I've only ever seen the one you linked at floppy disk drive interface)? —Locke Cole • t • c 20:05, 5 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
The lede says "connection" not "connector." Apparently one can buy an IDE FDD which would make the lede correct. I believe the 3.5-inch FDDs use a 34 pin version of the type of connector, originally from 3M, that is used in 50 pins for some forms of PATA interface. I suggest there is no need for a discussion of the connector similarities in this article. Tom94022 (talk) 07:10, 6 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
Agreed. The lead talks about connecting floppy disk drives using PATA, which is/was the common thing for SuperDisk and Zip drive. --Zac67 07:41, 6 July 2025 (UTC)
OK, but the lead links to actual floppy disks, so either an explanation about why we're linking to that needs to be in the body somewhere (per summary style writing), or the link needs to be removed. —Locke Cole • t • c 14:06, 6 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
Why? The lede also links to optical disc drives and tape drives some which also can connect thru PATA and it doesn't mention SSDs - if anything, we should add them. Tom94022 (talk) 15:57, 6 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
Optical disc drives used the connector discussed here. Floppy disk drives, to my knowledge, never did (and at any rate, this article never discusses them directly, but rather Superfloppy variants that never had the wide acceptance of what most people would consider a floppy disk). I never used a tape drive so I can't speak to that. I'm also not aware of any SSDs that utilized PATA (AFAIK they began as PCIEx initially, then SATA, before NVME and M.2 took over).
Just to be crystal clear here: if there's some reliable sources that discuss actual floppy disk drives using PATA (and the 40-pin connector described in this article) then let's add it. I can't possibly know everything.
Also, you keep using the term lede, just to be clear, Wikipedia does not have "lede" sections, we have lead sections (see WP:NOTALEDE for more on that and why the distinction is important, at least on this project). —Locke Cole • t • c 20:54, 6 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
The Floppy disk article includes links to three drives that used the PATA connector, not every tape drive nor every hard disk drive nor every optical disk drive used the PATA interface so the treatment in the lede is consistent, correct and need not be changed. BTW if you Google "IDE Floppy" or "PATA Floppy" you might be surprised to find standard low capacity 3.5-inch versions advertised, I was, and maybe they may not be real but it could be that someone actually did them, but that really doesn't matter, does it, given the three real products listed in the FD article. There is also the ZIP drive which may or may not be considered a floppy disk drive. BTW, I think the dictionary definition of lede fits and I don't think the editors of Wikipedia can deprecate English language used in a talk page. Tom94022 (talk) 05:57, 7 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
Re: PATA SSD - amazon /Crucial-BX500-1TB-2-5-SATA3/dp/B07YD579WM/ref=asc_df_B07YD579WM?mcid=4e6b86bbf74f327d885d29ecbf26b2bd&tag=googleshopdsk-22&linkCode=df0&hvadid=712357308389&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=10343781025867018869&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9070582&hvtargid=pla-840273997424&gad_source=1&th=1
I remember swapping a friend's 2.5" spinning rust (also PATA) for a similar SSD to give a very welcome improvement in response time when starting Windows 8 and its apps.  Stepho  talk  07:35, 7 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
The Floppy disk article includes links to three drives that used the PATA connector Floppy disk only seems to refer to the Floppy disk drive interface (and "modern" external USB options, obviously). If you're talking about the variants (other than 8", 5¼" and 3½"), those were never really considered "floppy disks" (Zac67 noted that SuperDisk and Zip drive were two such examples; but again, never really considered "floppy disks"). BTW if you Google "IDE Floppy" or "PATA Floppy" you might be surprised to find standard low capacity 3.5-inch versions advertised I tried these queries in Google, and turned up products with IDE and PATA in their description, but upon closer inspection they utilized the Floppy disk drive interface.
Can you link to a specific product that shows a traditional floppy drive using PATA? Or quote and cite a Wikipedia page that says as much? —Locke Cole • t • c 16:09, 7 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
Most all if not all super floppies's had a PATA variant; some even acted as conventional FDDs reading and writing standard low-capacity media! And the lead sentence of that section is A number of attempts were made by various companies to introduce newer floppy-disk formats ... (both emphases added). Three models are lsited in and linked out of in the article linked in the lede. Opinion that these are somehow not floppies is pretty much irrelevant given the overwhelming evidence in Wikipedia and elsewhere that these products are considered floppies and they had PATA interfaces. Tom94022 (talk) 07:02, 8 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
The key word here is "attempt", these variants never achieved the wide acceptance of the two major floppy disk formats, and none of those used PATA. Your interpretation of the success or its relevance is interesting but irrelevant, we report what reliable sources report, and so far no sources are provided that support the statement that was made. —Locke Cole • t • c 08:15, 8 July 2025 (UTC) —Locke Cole • t • c 08:15, 8 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
"Wide acceptance" is an opinion, not evidence and not true since it's hard to say that ZIP did not have wide acceptance, Even 25 years later the Iomega zip is unforgettable, and for that matter the evidence is that both Floptical and SuperDisk had "wide acceptance." Furthermore, Wikipedia and many RS's refer to all three as floppy disks and some of those linked [super] floppies read and wrote 3½-inch standard format so the lede is accurate in stating PATA served as a connection for some "floppy disk drives" just like it is accurate for some "hard disk drive"s, some "optical disk drive]]"s, etc. Tom94022 (talk) 20:20, 8 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
The WP:BURDEN is on you to prove that reliable sources refer to those other formats as "floppy disks" to the same extent as the 3.5" and 5.25" versions. Otherwise, we are misleading our readers in suggesting that PATA was utilized for those older drives (which, again, they do not appear to have been). —Locke Cole • t • c 02:06, 9 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
The claim is not the the ZIP disk and LS-120 disk media are called floppy disks. They weren't - although they were sometimes known as a super floppy. The claim is that the drive was called a floppy drive. Considering that the drive was connected by a PATA cable and could read/write a standard 1.44 MB floppy disk (in addition to the super floppy), then it fits the category of a PATA connected floppy drive. Surely you aren't saying that an LS-120 or ZIP disk could not read/write a standard 1.44 MB floppy disk. There weren't on practically every desktop like the standard floppy drive but they were certainly well-known in the industry. PATA tape drives were also a minority on desktops but well-known in the industry - although far, far less than SCSI tape drives. If you don't want to link super floppy in the lead then you should also remove tape drives.
@LC: "Your interpretation of the success or its relevance is interesting but irrelevant". Strange, that's exactly what I thought of your interpretation. But to keep to facts instead of name calling, let's try to agree on some definitions. Are you saying the ZIP drive and LS-120 drive could not read/write 1.44 MB floppies? Or that they did not have a PATA variant?  Stepho  talk  04:26, 9 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
WP:SYNTH, now go find a reliable source that calls an LS-120 a "floppy drive" in the context of discussing the PATA connector. Also, only certain Zip drives could read an old-style floppy disk, not all could. Finally, the original text of the article linked directly to floppy disk, which only barely mentions LS-120/Zip. The source Tom provided above only mentions "floppy" in the context of comparing Zip disks to the success of traditional floppy disks, it does NOT call Zip disks "floppy disks" (because of course they aren't floppy disks). Strange, that's exactly what I thought of your interpretation. Except policy is firmly behind me in the form of WP:BURDEN; it's on editors wishing to include challenged language to PROVE a statement they wish to make in an article, it's not on editors challenging text to DISPROVE a statement prior to removal. —Locke Cole • t • c 13:55, 9 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Does this end this nonsense: [1]? Porter is an RS and he lists 29 models of high capacity floppy disk drives some of which have PATA interfaces. Tom94022 (talk) 19:14, 9 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Do you have a more contemporary source, one that doesn't rely on a dead tree edition? Surely if people called these "floppy disks" it should be easy to come up with something easily accessible and recent. —Locke Cole • t • c 03:16, 10 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
Really, something wrong with dead trees as an RS for a dead interface on dead products. Frankly, contemporaneous discussion is likely more reliable than what is posted online and Jim Porter is a particularly reliable source given his 25+ years as a storage industry consultant and historian - The Porter archive at the Computer History Musuem consists of 140 linear feet of materials (about 111 record cartons) and comprises a vast amount of seminal storage industry information including company profiles, conference proceedings, courses, presentations, market profiles, as well as documents relating to his numerous consulting activities. The materials span in time from about 1959 to 2010; most of his publications on such devices refer to them as high capacity floppy disk drives. You asked that I now go find a reliable source ..., I did, can we end this? Tom94022 (talk) 19:25, 10 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
So I'm just to take your good word on this? Since I have no way to verify your claim that the dead tree publication says the thing you claim it says? I'm struggling to believe that if these devices were so commonly referred to as "floppy disks" why you can't produce a source that's easily verifiable. Your first link contains a quote that kind of makes the point for me: The reports covered optical drives (CD, DVD), floppy disks, hard drives, and removable storage, like ZIP and Bernoulli disks and provide a long-term record of the global storage industry unlike any other. (wikilinks added) Note how the author (Dag Spicer) took care to separate out floppy disk[s] from removable storage, like ZIP and Bernoulli disks .... Clearly more recent sources don't conflate the two as you're suggesting. —Locke Cole • t • c 15:21, 11 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
@Locke Cole: See Floppy disk: A floppy disk [...] is a type of disk storage composed of a thin and flexible disk of a magnetic storage medium in a square or nearly square plastic enclosure [...] That is exactly what SuperDisks, ZIPs and the like are. I suggest you take your discussion over there if you disagree with that description. This page here is about Parallel ATA, the interface. --Zac67 (talk) 12:10, 12 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
I don't disagree with that description because, as a summary (which is what a WP:LEAD is) of the Floppy disk article (which fully covers the standard floppy disks, 3.5", 5.25" and 8"), it is an accurate description. Just because it coincidentally overlaps with two other unrelated formats that are not called "floppy disks" doesn't change what the issue at this article is. As a reminder, the issue is that this article is claiming floppy disks (3.5", 5.25" and 8") used PATA. They did not. —Locke Cole • t • c 16:23, 12 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
Actually since some of the high capacity floppy disk drives read conventional 3½-inch Floppy Disks the inclusion is consistent with a link to the article on Floppy disk. Since you have no support for you opinion, your deletion from the article is inappropriate and I am reversing. To get out of the nonsense I am going to remove the word "devices" which will make the sentence even more accurate. Tom94022 (talk) 00:15, 13 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
Most people will interpret "floppy disk" as the standard 3.5-inch 1.44 MB type (and the compatible earlier versions). As far as I am aware, no drive that read only this type of floppy used PATA. However, the super floppy drives often read these 1.44 floppies as well as their own more advance 20+ MB media. So I propose that we do not use "floppy disk" but do use "super floppy" (with that link). This is both technically acurate and not misleading.
Secondly, even if you think the current version is wrong, please stop flip-flopping the article. Nobody is going to die if it is wrong for a few days. Wait until the discussion has formed a consensus. See WP:BRD and WP:EDITWAR for reasons why this type of editing is bad.  Stepho  talk  00:34, 13 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Discussion reset

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I probably should have looked into this earlier, but floppy drive/disk was added to the lead with these two edits by an IP that made no further edits. At the time these edits were made, Floppy drive was a redirect to Floppy disk, and this was the state of that article at the time the link was added. In that old revision, ZIP and SuperDisk were discussed as "standard floppy replacements", but never called "floppy disks" directly.

Prior to this, "floppy disk/drive" was not listed in the lead of this article. It did not appear to be discussed on the talk page (and if it was, the IP didn't participate, as their only two contributions are the previously linked diff). This means, even though it's been in place for fifteen years, it only has a WP:SILENTCONSENSUS which is the weakest form of consensus.

What concerns me about including this exact language is the ongoing risk of citogenesis, that is, Wikipedia itself being used as a "source" for the claim that PATA was ever used for traditional floppy disk drives. WP:BURDEN, part of WP:V (which is policy) is very explicit about what must happen in this situation: All content must be verifiable. The burden to demonstrate verifiability lies with the editor who adds or restores material, and it is satisfied by providing an inline citation to a reliable source that directly supports[a] the contribution.[b] The bolded portion (bolded in original) is the really important part here, as it's been repeatedly re-added without any inline citations to support the statement. I came to the talk page prior to making any edits to the article over a week ago seeking sources to support the statement (because I genuinely thought I was wrong, or at least was missing something obvious). WP:BRD and WP:EDITWAR are important, but given the lack of sourcing, I feel justified in removing unsourced content until such time as reliable sourcing is found that meets the standards expected by WP:V and WP:RS.

In so far as @Stepho-wrs:'s idea to utilize super floppy, I would not object to it as a compromise, however, I still believe it fails WP:DUE to include it in the lead and has serious WP:BALASP issues. PATA was widely used for hard drives and optical disc drives (and maybe tape drives, as again, I never really played with the hardware on those). PATA was never used for traditional floppy drives, and while successor formats may have utilized the connection, their lack of widespread adoption (to the same degree as optical drives and hard drives) would seem to indicate no need to mention them together in the lead of this article. —Locke Cole • t • c 16:27, 13 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

If need be, please discuss at Talk:Floppy disk. Practically any reasonable source I queried uses a definition for floppy disk that includes formats other than the once ubiquitous 3.5 and 5.25 in formats – [2], [3], [4]. To exclude formats like SuperDisk or ZIP is your very personal view and WP:OR. --Zac67 (talk) 20:39, 13 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
I've gone ahead and corrected Floppy disk to match what the source says. FWIW, the language that said "three most popular" was a recent addition that was unsourced. As to your dictionary definition links... okay... it's a dictionary, not an encyclopedia. Dictionaries are not known for exhaustive descriptions of objects typically, that's why encyclopedias exist. —Locke Cole • t • c 22:02, 13 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
@Zac67: BTW, it's not WP:NOR to note the absence of any sources supporting a statement. What is original research is the WP:SYNTH some here are using to take statements from separate sources and try to make them say what they clearly want them to say... We don't get to play 2+2 with our sources to claim they say 4. —Locke Cole • t • c 01:26, 14 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
Funny story, the very first source listed in the lead at floppy disk is
  • "Floppy Disk: History & Definition". Encyclopedia Britannica. 2009-03-12. Archived from the original on 16 June 2024. Retrieved 2024-06-16.
Which was updated just last month, and has this passage, They were made of flexible plastic coated with a magnetic material and enclosed in a hard square plastic case. The first floppy disks were 8 inches (20 cm) across. In the late 1970s, floppy disks became smaller, with the arrival of 5.25-inch (13.3-cm) models, and the final floppy disks, which debuted in the 1980s, were 3.5 inches (9 cm) in diameter. Notwithstanding MOS:TENSE concerns, this seems kind of definitive to me on the question of "what is a floppy disk?" that has caused so much gnashing of teeth in the discussion above. It's gonna take some pretty exceptional sources to sustain the claim that ZIP or SuperDisks were ever "floppy disks" to anyone beyond their small base of users (and even then, they likely used the trademarked name to avoid confusion with actual floppy disks). —Locke Cole • t • c 19:01, 14 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
Many of the high-capacity floppy disks were in the same shell as the "standard" 3½-inch FDD so the Britanica definition is not dispositive.
I haven't had a chance to go back to dead wood to find what the industry said about such devices when they were actively marketed but with just a few minutes of searching:
We have Porter for at least 8 years (1992-1999) publishing contemporaneous market analyses that refer to all such devices as floppy disk drives and their media as floppy disks along with the above contemporaneous support above which I suppose Cole will ignore or deprecate. What is really troubling is there has never been much discussion much less a consensus on these issues, 2:1 against his proposed changes, yet Cole made a massive destructive change to the Floppy Disk Article. As far as this article goes, adding back in the "device" restriction to the lede makes it less accurate since standard 3½-inch floppy disks could be accessed thru the PATA interface of some high-capacity floppy disk drives. I will wait for a response here from @Locke Cole: before reverting . Tom94022 (talk) 18:38, 15 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
Not entirely sure why you feel I need to reply to what is fundamentally the same arguments in two places, but as the discussion has moved to Talk:Floppy_disk#Revert_or_Retitle_Article, I already addressed these "sources" in detail there. To my knowledge, and there are no sources to support this either so far, there are no floppy disk drives that utilize PATA. —Locke Cole • t • c 04:00, 24 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
@Zac67: the talk page is over here, you should probably propose a source here rather than wasting time reverting {{cn}} tags that require you to meet WP:BURDEN to remove. In addition to what I said in my reversion, I'll add your source is from 2001, and appears to be discussing information from five years prior to that. It also reads a bit like press release reporting, and of course these manufacturers were all promoting themselves as the "next floppy disk". None of them succeeded, of course, some had loyal followings, but most people moved on to USB mass storage or CD/DVD-RW. As it's also reporting, it likely runs afoul of WP:NOTNEWS, and for the broad claim being made in the lead, you'll need a better source than that. Almost forgot, but the provided source that I reverted also made no mention of Parallel ATA, so it's also a WP:SYNTH violation. —Locke Cole • t • c 03:42, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
There was no need to revert the new source addition (it's valid and usable). Instead, you could have simply re-added the {{cn}} request as unsatisfied. I might be a bit thick, but do we actually need a cite for "LS and Zip use PATA" (among other interfaces)? Just to make sure that there's not another revert spree. --Zac67 (talk) 12:16, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
There was no need to revert the new source addition (it's valid and usable). If all you'd have done was add a source, I'd have likely left the edit alone, but as you removed the {{cn}} tag, you appeared to be suggesting the source you provided was adequate to satisfy WP:BURDEN for restoring challenged material. Your source was not, as I explained in the reply above and in the edit summary. Recall that the challenged text reads as follows:
  • The connection is used for computer storage such as hard disk, floppy disk, optical disk, and tape.
As the specific issue is with "floppy disk", you can distill the challenged text down to The connection is used for computer storage such as floppy disk. Recall again, your BURDEN to restore challenged material:
  • The burden to demonstrate verifiability lies with the editor who adds or restores material, and it is satisfied by providing an inline citation to a reliable source that directly supports[a] the contribution.[c]
Your source does not explicitly state that a "floppy disk" uses Parallel ATA for it's connection. If you're trying to claim that your provided source, when taken with other sources, is supporting the challenged statement, I'll remind you of WP:SYNTH. I see you've restored your citation, but as it's an irrelevant citation, I trust you know you should probably remove it. —Locke Cole • t • c 14:38, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply
Also consider WP:OLDSOURCES, specifically, Especially in scientific and academic fields, older sources may be inaccurate because new information has been brought to light, new theories proposed, or vocabulary changed. In this instance, older sources may have been trying to categorize up and coming technologies like Zip and LS-120 as “floppy disks” (though qualifying such naming with terms like “high-capacity floppy disk” or “super floppy”), but newer sources have the benefit of hindsight and can correct for unexpected shifts in the marketplace. —Locke Cole • t • c 05:09, 25 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Storage attached thru PATA

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In the absence of further discussion and the lack of consensus I reverted the lede. It is now accurate for hard disk storage and floppy disk storage because the linked articles specifically include PATA is an interface of some of the devices for these two classes of storage, note that in the FD this includes both low-capacity floppy disk storage and high-capacity floppy disk storage. There is no such support for the other storage at their linked articles so these links might be considered an easter egg, particularly tape storage, although I suspect it is well known that such storage in some configurations, like Floppy Disk, are connected to computers using PATA. The reverted version misleads by implicitly excluding low-capacity floppy disks. Tom94022 (talk) 16:19, 18 July 2025 (UTC)Reply

Notes/References

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Notes

  1. ^ a b A source "directly supports" a given piece of material if the information is present explicitly in the source, so that using this source to support the material is not a violation of Wikipedia:No original research. The ___location of any citation—including whether one is present in the article at all—is unrelated to whether a source directly supports the material. For questions about where and how to place citations, see Wikipedia:Citing sources, Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lead section § Citations, etc.
  2. ^ Once an editor has provided any source they believe, in good faith, to be sufficient, then any editor who later removes the material must articulate specific problems that would justify its exclusion from Wikipedia (e.g., why the source is unreliable; the source does not support the claim; undue emphasis; unencyclopedic content; etc.). If necessary, all editors are then expected to help achieve consensus, and any problems with the text or sourcing should be fixed before the material is added back.
  3. ^ Once an editor has provided any source they believe, in good faith, to be sufficient, then any editor who later removes the material must articulate specific problems that would justify its exclusion from Wikipedia (e.g., why the source is unreliable; the source does not support the claim; undue emphasis; unencyclopedic content; etc.). If necessary, all editors are then expected to help achieve consensus, and any problems with the text or sourcing should be fixed before the material is added back.

Zdnet source

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Latest comment: 18 days ago16 comments3 people in discussion

I looked at https://www.zdnet.com/article/five-years-ago-120mb-floppy-gets-mobile/ from 2001. It says, in part, predicts huge sales for next year when manufacturing steps up, and parallel port and PC Card versions of the drive appear.

There are a lot of different kinds of parallel port. I'm pretty sure that my own Zip drive used Parallel SCSI, but Zip drive#Interfaces says (unsourced) that a few early Zip drives used IDE. Is there a source that actually says "Parallel ATA" or "IDE"? What's happening here is the equivalent of taking a source that says "I had a Mac in 2001" and turning it into "She had a Power Mac G3 Blue and White in 2001". It might be true, but it's an abuse of the source.

And even if we find one, is this really WP:DUE? Parallel ATA was mostly not used for floppy drives, and if we can't easily find good sources for this, then that suggests that we shouldn't include it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:08, 1 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

According to Porter's 1998 Disk/Trend Report of the 23 high-capacity FDDs (out of 30 in total) that have interfaces identified, 11 models supported PATA in one form or another, more than any other interface. This should be an RS that PATA was used for such FDDs. It gets back to the definition of FD and there is no RS that high-capacity FDDs were not FDDs. Most of the Wiki articles covering high-capacity FDDs so state they are FDDs but one editor seems determined to insert his POV that they are not. Mee is another source. Maybe today some folks have forgotten HCFDDs but the evidence is overwhelming that they were FDDs. Tom94022 (talk) 06:26, 2 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
I don't think that's true. Some editors seem determined to present the view that my Zip drive was a floppy; other editors think that's not the same subject. If you're old enough to have used them, then I'm sure you remember hearing conversations like "It's all on my Zip drive. I'll bring the disk over" – "Oh, sorry, I don't have a Zip drive. This computer can only handle floppies". WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:36, 2 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
23 high-capacity FDDs (out of 30 in total) that have interfaces identified, 11 models supported PATA in one form or another Cool. Now, how many actual floppy drives are listed as using PATA? —Locke Cole • t • c 19:50, 2 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
I really don't know what you mean by actual floppy drives - the LS120 family read and wrote low-capacity FDs as did the Floptical, are they actual floppy drives? Porter in the same issue lists only 24 3½-inch FDDs without identifying the interface but I am sure they were all of the traditional low-capacity FDD interface. So available in the market at least 11 to 24? Tom94022 (talk) 17:49, 3 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
I agree that if "traditional" floppies didn't use it, then we shouldn't say this, or at minimum should say something like "high-capacity FDDs", so as to not mislead readers by using a less-common definition of the word.
But what I'd really like to know is more like: If you had a representative sample of devices using Parallel ATA over the years, then how many of them would be any kind of floppy variant? If the answer is almost all hard drives and tape drives, then mentioning floppies in the first paragraph is probably WP:UNDUE. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:05, 3 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
The language is now structured in terms of storage and not devices, there are multiple RS's that traditional Floppy Disks were accessed thru high-capacity FDDs using PATA. I suspect similar issues with optical and tape, SCSI was the predominant interface for tape and with optical we have a similar situation to FD, CD/DVD mainly thru PATA but other optical thru SCSI. So, the language is correct and supported by RS's but if the consensus is that we have to weigh the relative % of something (units, revenue, GB, subsets, ?) in order to list it then we probably can't list anything. Note the whole lede sentence has no support in the article, but I do think it is supported in the various linked articles, specifically the Superfloppy article mentions PATA and compatible with some traditional low-capacity FDs. So, there is an existence proof. Tom94022 (talk) 17:49, 3 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
I don't think you're understanding my point.
For the sake of argument, imagine that you've found "10" reliable sources that say some floppies (or certain floppies) used Parallel ATA. But there are "1,000" similar sources for hard drives, and "500" for tape drives and "100" for optical drives.
The question isn't "Is it verifiable that a non-zero number of floppy drives used Parallel ATA?" The question becomes "If only 0.6% of sources about devices are about floppy drives, then should floppy drives be mentioned in the third sentence?"
The goal for the first paragraph looks like this:
  • "The connection is used for computer storage such as [common use] and [common use]."
The goal for the first paragraph does not look like this:
  • "The connection is used for computer storage such as [every single device type for which I can document the existence of at least one commercial product, no matter how rare or unusual]."
Which category does this fall into? WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:08, 3 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
Neither category.
  • I doubt if there is any RS for determining "common use" and I am not even sure what it means. Counting RS's about interfaces and devices sounds like OR and is going to be biased by life cycles, shipment volumes and marketing budgets. PATA HDDs had a long life cycle and high volume so they will likely overwhelm the RS count; optical is the opposite problem of FD, although out of production CD/DVD will likely have a lot of RS's while other optical will be very low. One possible RS would be units shipped, that's probably requiring OR, but my guess is it would look like HDDs then CD/DVD and then a very, very large decrease in numbers to maybe FD, tape and other optical in that order. BTW, even with your hypothetical 0.6% of a large number is a large number and suppose it is more like 10,000, 100, 4900/100, 100?
  • FD usage of PATA was way above rare and unusual, ZIP and LS120 had substantial market presence.
Shouldn't the category be "usage above an WP:UNDUE level" which then could be adjudicated by consensus in a discussion. There are many RS's that HCFDs are FDs and none so far that they are not. The limited consensus so far on this talk page is that such FDs using PATA is due recognition in this article. It's probably 1t would be accurate to say something like "The primary use of this connection is for storage such as HDD and CD/DVD but it was used for other storage such as Floppy Disk, other optical disc and Tape." but that is OR so I suggest what is there without the tags is Tom94022 (talk) 20:14, 5 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
@WhatamIdoing:FWIW,
LS-120 drives were available as options on many computers, including desktop and notebook computers from Compaq Computer Corporation. In the case of the Compaq notebooks, the LS-120 drive replaced the standard floppy drive in a multibay configuration. from Floppy_disk_variants#LS-120/LS-240,
sort of makes my point about "usage above an WP:UNDUE level"; note the phrase "the standard floppy drive," which at that time means 3½-inch FD, so on many Compaq laptops this was the only way to read a standard FD seems way more than "rare and unusual". BTW, the quote is not referenced nor does it clearly associate the HDFDD with PATA but I am pretty sure it is true - do you think it needs a ref? Tom94022 (talk) 18:30, 6 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
The fact that the LS-120 drive is contrasted with, and therefore not, "the standard floppy drive" makes me think that saying "PATA was used for floppies" is WP:DUE.
They are non-standard floppy drives, but they are still a floppy drives aren't they? This is confirmed by all published reliable sources which gives their inclusion in this article the necessary due weight. We have a similar issue for all PATA storage use; it was used on most but not all HDDs, some but not many FDD, most but not all optical and some but not all tape. If one could find an RS that "PATA's typical use was for connecting storage devices such as HDDs and CD/DVD's to computers." that would be an acceptable alternative, but I doubt if one could find an RS for such a statement. There isn't a lot of published material on the subject of relative usage of interfaces.Tom94022 (talk) 00:34, 7 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
If you think that Zip drives and Super drives were common uses of PATA, then that argues for saying "high-capacity floppies". It does not support a claim for saying "floppies", because unqualified/undescribed "floppies" means either all of them (which is known false) or the standard/usual types (which is neither Zip drives nor Super drives). WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:29, 6 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
It is the other way around, PATA was common on high-capacity FDDs. I think when u say Floppies, or any other noun that is subdividable, you mean any non-trivial subset. But even if your definition is correct there is no common meaning of "standard" or "usual" and LS120 was standard on some products. I suppose I can support,
The connection is used for computer storage devices such as hard disk drives, optical disk drives, some floppy disk drives and some tape drives.
Can you? Tom94022 (talk) 00:34, 7 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
I mean, it's a SuperDisk/LS-120 drive that is backwards compatible with floppy disks. It's not a floppy disk drive, it's a SuperDisk/LS-120 drive. —Locke Cole • t • c 00:40, 7 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
Can you please stop edit warring over including "floppy disk" as a device that used this connection? No floppy disk drive has used PATA, they used a similar connector for the 3.5" drives, and a totally different connector for 5.25" and 8" drives. PATA was used primarily for hard drives and optical disc drives. Some formats that attempted to succeed floppy disks used this connector, but not to the same degree as HDD and ODD, so in addition to not meeting WP:ONUS, it's patently WP:UNDUE. —Locke Cole • t • c 19:51, 12 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
About this: They are non-standard floppy drives, but they are still a floppy drives aren't they?
If you write "used on floppy drives", people will reasonably infer that you actually mean "used on all/most/normal/standard floppy drives".
When (as appears to be the case here) you actually mean "used on devices that are technically floppies but are non-standard ones", then you need to either leave it out or add some qualifications. I prefer just leaving it out of the lead, but if we include it, it needs to say something like "some floppy drives" or "non-standard floppy drives" or "some high-capacity floppy drives", or something like that.
For comparison, consider:
The first sentence is technically true, but most people won't have the background information to know that it was never a common configuration, and that it has rarely been used in new designs for almost a century now. The addition of a single word gives people a hint that this was not the most common thing. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:05, 12 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
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