GoTEK SFR1M44-U100 3.5 Inch 1.44MB USB SSD Floppy Drive Emulator Gray

Works great on an old Tandy 1000 I've been tinkering on.

Recently I've gotten very involved in retro computing. But in 2020, messing with tiny floppy disks is absolutely no fun. Bad sectors, dirty drives, it's just not a great experience. Enter this thing. It allows you to easily turn any old USB drive into 1000 floppy disks, and just push a button to swap between them. It works on any old PC or other devices that use floppy disks for storage (synths, etc). Some notes about the default firmware that's on the device: * The software to use the device is... interesting and a bit annoying. * It's Windows only. * It will only work with DOS and devices that support DOS. With that said, it's trivial to flash a replacement firmware onto this device that turns it into an absolute POWERHOUSE (FlashFloppy, Google it). It just requires VERY minor soldering skills (my toddler could probably do it) and a USB-A to A cable like this: https://www.amazon.com/Rankie-Cable-Type-1-Pack-Feet/dp/B01KRO8D20/ With the replacement firmware you get: * WAY easier to manage from basically anywhere, Mac, Linux, Windows, etc. * Able to use it with other old devices like Amigas. * Can easily replace the simple LCD with a full-featured OLED screen, again with MINOR soldering skills. In all, a massive value for the money even if you just keep the stock firmware.

I've used this emulator for loading startup disks for installing Windows 95 & 98. You can format a flash drive (the older the better) as a 1.44Mb floppy disk and you'll be able to go back and forth between a modern PC and the GoTEK easily.

this item does not come with any software, so you have to download it from the manufacturer's site. to be perfectly honest, the software is pretty bad. however, once you get around that, and you update the firmware, and you change the display from 3-digit to OLED, and you install a rotary switch, it's a really good drive and easy to use. i can't imagine storing 1000 images on a USB stick, and then having to push buttons to address them all.

Bought 2 of these emulators to replace the failing floppy drives in my Prototrak CNC mill. You'll also need a floppy to USB harness to set it up. They are all over Amazon for cheap. Downloaded the program from Gotek site to format the USB sticks then installed the SWI software just like I was making a new disk. Really pretty slick. Boots up and runs perfect plus have pretty much unlimited storage now for saving programs.