Question: How long does it take to copy 1.0 MB of data onto a 3" floppy 
disk?

Answer: I gave up after waiting about 25 minutes.



Of course, actually formatting the whole disk only takes about 30 
seconds, so there's no way copying the data to it should take that long. 
Is there?

Well, in this instance, there is. You see, for whatever reason, there's 
an issue with putting many small files onto such a disk. I don't know 
whether the issue is with the file system design or just the OS 
implementation, but it appears that every file creation operation 
involves writing the file's data to one block, and updating the file 
listing in another block. The result is that if you create many hundred 
tiny files, the [extremely slow] R/W heads spend forever repeatedly 
tracking back and forth, once per file. In this instance, copy time is 
proportional to the /number/ of files, not their /size/.

Quite why Windows can't just write the final listing to the directory 
block and then write all the file data blocks sequentially is beyond me, 
but anyway...

Fortunately, copying said files /off/ the disk again is slightly 
quicker. But only slightly.



But why do I know all this? I'll tell you why. Last week one of the 
ancient PCs in our lab stopped working. As in, you turn it on, all the 
lights come on, all the fans spin... and nothing else happens. The 
lights are on, but nobody's home.

Now, the PC was pretty damned warm. I came back the next day and it 
suddenly decided to work again. But each time it works for a while and 
then stops working once it gets warm. I removed several throw rugs' 
worth of dust, hair and fluff from the inside of the thing, but it's 
still not working reliably.

I suppose I could try to repair it. But... are you kidding me? Let's 
look at the spec sheet here:

Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-5AX
Processor: AMD K6 II with 3DNow!, 500 MHz
Memory: 128MB DDR1
Harddrive: 4.2 GB PATA
Graphics: S3 Trio3D/2X APG
Sound: None
Optical drive: None
Network: SMC 1211TX

Can you see why the inside might be a little dusty? Still, we only use 
this thing to run an old 16-bit Windows 3 program that controls some 
gear via a serial port. (Astonishingly, this works with Windows XP. Go 
figure...)

Anyway, at one time /all/ our PCs were to this exact spec. We bought a 
big batch of them so they would all be identical. Nice idea, but that 
was a few years ago now. (!) So I had a hunt around, and managed to find 
an 800 MHz Intel Celeron brick. So I installed the software on that, 
managed to get the failing PC to work for long enough to upload all the 
configuration files to a network share, unplugged the failing PC, moved 
the replacement into place, and...

...now the integrated NIC on the replacement PC doesn't work. No reason. 
It just doesn't. No matter how much I poke and prod it, I can't get any 
activity lights out of it. Not interested. Won't work.

Both PCs had perfectly OK network access before I started (as evidenced 
by the many network operations performed just prior to the move). If I 
unplug the network cable and plug it into any other device, it works. 
But it *refuses* to work when plugged into the replacement PC. For no 
reason other than to spite me.

Needless to say, I was extremely angry by the time I went home yesterday...

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