Releasing an Album on Floppy Disk

Music disks used to be a thing in the 90&#x27;s demo scene.<p>Like this 111 KB rendition of &quot;Axel F&quot; they did not sound like crap. <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;modarchive.org&#x2F;index.php?request=view_by_moduleid&amp;query=32394" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;modarchive.org&#x2F;index.php?request=view_by_moduleid&amp;qu...</a>

Now I wonder how much music you could fit on a floppy if you recorded the analog signal? A double-sided floppy drive would be perfect for stereo, one side for each channel. Maybe use a spiral track like on CDs instead of the usual concentric tracks? But of course that would require custom-made (or heavily modified) floppy drives, and it would sound about the same as a cassette.

The last time I put music on a floppy disk was 20 years ago, trying to get a single mp3 off an old Windows 95 computer with no USB or network support. I had to use WinRAR to split the file up across multiple disks, move it to a more modern system, and stitch it back together. It worked, if I never wanted to use another floppy disk after that. I wasn’t completely successful, but that’s due to work stuff that couldn’t ve avoided, and was far less annoying.<p>I will have to pass the floppy disk music scene. The idea brings back annoying memories.

Related:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=39534616">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=39534616</a> - The floppy disk music scene (2024-02-28)

Having a scull on an album cover reminds me some dissident vinil recordings made on used x-ray negatives typically with somebody&#x27;s bones photographed on it.

Not the same but there&#x27;s a netlabel called 20kbps[0]. Most of their albums are mp3s around 10-20 MB in total.<p>[0]: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;20kbps.net&#x2F;index2.htm" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;20kbps.net&#x2F;index2.htm</a>

Funny this should come out a day or two after I downloaded and played Alcatraz&#x27;s &quot;Memorial Songs&quot; musicdisk (actually 2 disks, featuring tunes by Lizardking, who was pretty much the Brian Eno of the demoscene): <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=S4mskWhgAVM" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=S4mskWhgAVM</a>

I will add the music is really catchy.<p>edit: I Am Not Afraid samples what is imo the best hold-music of all time at the end. nice touch ;)

Upvote just for the title and idea

Cool! There are also folks on Bandcamp who have floppy releases as a thing. Here&#x27;s one: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;powerlunch.bandcamp.com&#x2F;merch" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;powerlunch.bandcamp.com&#x2F;merch</a>

I have great memories of downloading MIDI files found with Altavista, Yahoo or even something like midi.com, then putting them on a floppy and have them play back on my Technics KN-2000 keyboard. Then MP3 happened.

You can release them as midi files, those would easily fit on a floppy..

OT loved disc magazines of the 80s

Using TSAC should render a much higher quality: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=39975331">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=39975331</a>

&gt; My final diskettes will contain a single song, so the first thing I need to do is glue these 10 songs together into one. In other words, I need to concatenate them.<p>&gt; To do that I&#x27;ll use ffmpeg, a free and open source audio and video encoding suite.<p>&gt; Superuser user, evilsoup, explains very clearly how to concatenate files using ffmpeg.<p>... or you can just issue<p><pre><code> copy input1.wav+input2.wav+input3.wav+input4.wav output.wav</code></pre>

I&#x27;m disappointed that they didn&#x27;t use DMF <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Distribution_Media_Format" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Distribution_Media_Format</a> to get about 17% more space for higher, uh, &quot;quality&quot;.<p>DMF was on HN a couple of weeks ago or so, but I can&#x27;t find it.