8mm data cartridges

[Jules Richardson]

Mr Ian Primus wrote:
> --- Jules Richardson <julesrichardsonuk at yahoo.co.uk>
> wrote:
> 
>> How common were drives which could read these? I
>> suspect the answer is "not 
>> very"! If anyone has one, how reliable was/is the
>> media?
> 
> Actually, they're pretty common from what I have seen,
> but then again, I work with lots of systems that use
> them. Those are Exabyte cartridges - you need to find
> an Exabyte drive. 

Aha... interesting. I'll give local Freecycle a prod and see if anyone has one 
nearby that I can borrow. What with Andy's post and another offer off-list I 
expect I can attempt a read at some point, anyway!

> The Exabyte drives are SCSI, and are pretty reliable.

That's good to hear. They reminded me of big DAT tapes, and I've had some 
pretty nasty experiences with DAT in the past :-)

> Both tapes and drives seem pretty reliable, and using
> video tape for data DOES work, although it's not
> technically reccomended.

Well as I'm not sure what's even on them - and whatever is on there is 
probably something very dull - I'm not too fussed if they turn out to be 
unreadable. I just figured I should make an effort to at least try!

cheers

J.