IOmega

[Jerome H. Fine]

 >Chuck Guzis wrote:

>>On 26 Feb 2008 at 16:01, Jerome H. Fine wrote:
>  
>
>>Not sure if this helps, but Iomega produced a SCSI "insider" (if that is
>>the correct name used for marketing) which was a drive with a removable
>>cartridge of 196608 blocks.  The drives were the size of a 3 1/2" disk
>>drive and the media were just a bit bigger than a 3 1/2" floppy and about
>>twice as thick.
>>
>Are you perhaps thinking of the Zip or Jaz drives?  Both were 
>available in SCSI (as well as other interfaces), but the Bernoullis 
>predated them quite a bit and later models of the Bernoulli were 
>fully SCSI compatible.
>
Jerome Fine replies:

Although both the drive and media have the word "Zip" on them,
I didn't notice until you helped me to remember that they are
indeed called Zip drives.  I feel I was fortunate to have the
internal SCSI version.  For the PC, there is a full set of software
tools available.  For the PDP-11, they are just nice ordinary
drives with removable media - although the software WRITE
PROTECT feature requires the PC software tools to toggle the
status of the media.

>The Jaz was an execrable excuse for a removable media drive.  My 
>Syquest Sparq is still going strong, but the two Jaz drives I have 
>are paperweights.  OTOH, the last time I fired up my dual 90MB 
>Bernoulli box, it worked flawlessly.
>
>IIRC, Steve Gibson made some waves with his Iomega "Click of Death" 
>diagnosis of the Zip drive.
>
Which is why I stopped relying on the Zip drive when I heard about the 
"feature".
By that time, I had graduated to the Sony SMO S-501, so it was not a 
problem.

These days, the disk drives can hold everything I want to save online - 
including
a year of backup files.  After that, I make a copy to a DVD.  In a year 
or two,
after I upgrade to a new system, I guess I will break down and get a 
blueray.
Everything I have should fit on a single media.

Sincerely yours,

Jerome Fine