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First post, by fsmith2003

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I have a SCSI external Zip drive with a 25pin SCSI cable. I ordered an Adaptec 2940uw SCSI pci card for my vintage builds. This has the 68 pin 16bit external connector. Is there an adapter to connect the Zip drive to this at all?

Reply 1 of 5, by darry

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fsmith2003 wrote on 2021-09-15, 03:59:

I have a SCSI external Zip drive with a 25pin SCSI cable. I ordered an Adaptec 2940uw SCSI pci card for my vintage builds. This has the 68 pin 16bit external connector. Is there an adapter to connect the Zip drive to this at all?

The 2940UW supports both LVD and SE devices . The ZIP drive is SE . You just need the proper passive adapter/cable to make the connection and set termination properly.

This is an example, not an endorsement . https://www.datastoragecables.com/scsi/extern … bles/hd68-db25/

Since you will be using an 8-bit device on a 16-bit SCSI bus adapter, you should also read this : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCSI_high_byte_termination

Reply 2 of 5, by fsmith2003

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darry wrote on 2021-09-15, 04:23:

The 2940UW supports both LVD and SE devices . The ZIP drive is SE . You just need the proper passive adapter/cable to make the connection and set termination properly.

This is an example, not an endorsement . https://www.datastoragecables.com/scsi/extern … bles/hd68-db25/

Since you will be using an 8-bit device on a 16-bit SCSI bus adapter, you should also read this : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCSI_high_byte_termination

Thanks for the suggestions! However, I am not very well versed in the SCSI world. If I bought this cable you linked to would I then require anything additional when plugging in only the ZIP drive? Any additional terminators or anything? The high byte termination stuff is well over my head. 🤣

Reply 4 of 5, by dionb

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fsmith2003 wrote on 2021-09-15, 13:37:

[...]

Thanks for the suggestions! However, I am not very well versed in the SCSI world. If I bought this cable you linked to would I then require anything additional when plugging in only the ZIP drive? Any additional terminators or anything? The high byte termination stuff is well over my head. 🤣

It's not that complicated fortunately.

The cable you link to includes high byte terminator, so that half of the bus is terminated. What that means is you need to terminate the other half (low byte) that goes towards the drive - which is no different to situation if you just had a 'regular' narrow SCSI 25p/50p connector. IIRC there's termination built into the drive, just set the terminator switch to 'on' and you're good.