Re: [TCLUG:14864] power-eject floppy drives for PCs?

[Chris McKinley <lamfada@lugh.net>]

I had hoped that the Castlwood ORB drives would be well supported, as a 
sub-$200 external SCSI (or internal SCSI, IDE, or external  parallel) drive
with <$100 2.2GB media sounded great.  I have since learned, though, that 
Castlewood is not interested in supporting Linux, either by writing drivers
or by opening specs.  So for me, it looks like it is redundancy, and CD-R/CD-RW
until I scrape the cash together for a VXA tape drive.  It is a 33/66GB tape
with 6MB/sec writes, external or internal scsi.  If you haven't seen their ads,
they do some wacky stuff with tapes, like freezing them in blocks of ice, then
restoring the data from them.  They are also gung-ho for Linux, and are 
`certified' under Linux.  I have been trying to win one, but alas, someone 
in Boston got it.  So, unless they come down a lot, they start at about $900,
but the tapes are $30 for 12/24GB, $80 for 33/66GB.  If you get the `kit', it
is $100 more, but comes with cabling and terminator, and a tape and a cleaning
tape.  External is $150 premium over internal.  

I do not work for VXA, nor will I benefit from this in any way.  Nevertheless,
it appears to me that this drive offers roughly the same performance as DLT, 
with less hassle and for about half the price.  

-Chris McKinley

On Sat, 18 Mar 2000, Eric M. Hopper wrote:

> On Fri, Mar 17, 2000 at 11:37:05PM -0600, Scott Dier - dieman wrote:
> > On Fri, 17 Mar 2000, Eric M. Hopper wrote:
> > 
> > > 	Out of curiosity, what's so bad about Zip drives?
> > 
> > click of death.
> 
> 	I've been reading about this all morning.  Interesting.
> 
> 	Luckily, my drive is an older, SCSI model, so I don't think I'll
> be visited by this problem, but I should probably still make a point of
> making backups to a different media.
> 
> 	I had already resolved to not by iomega again because their
> media is too expensive.  I knew this before, but bought from them anyway
> because they were the people who jump started the removable mass storage
> market, and I felt like I should support them.
> 
> 	I'll next be getting either an LS-120, or something bigger, if
> it exists.
> 
> Thanks,
> -- 
> Its name is Public Opinion.  It is held in reverence. It settles everything.
> Some think it is the voice of God.  Loyalty to petrified opinion never yet
> broke a chain or freed a human soul.     ---Mark Twain
> -- Eric Hopper (hopper@omnifarious.mn.org  http://omnifarious.mn.org/~hopper) --
>