VOGONS


Iomega ZIP drives

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First post, by kixs

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Is there any real use of them? I never had one.

Now I see they cost around 5-10€ (internal IDE or external LPT) for 100MB or 250MB units. But I'm not sure if there is any use of them. All my retro computers have at least CD-ROM, some CF2IDE adapters.

Requests are also possible... /msg kixs

Reply 1 of 49, by obobskivich

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Years ago they were somewhat popular for back-ups, when CD-R/RW wasn't as popular or widespread. They died pretty quickly with the advent of CD-RW and then USB pen drives. They're not unuseful as storage/back-up media, but I don't think they make disks for them anymore, and I don't remember them being the fastest thing in the world either.

Reply 2 of 49, by Tetrium

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I try to find a use for them, I think they're fun in a way. They can still be useful for transferring files across.
And the disks I got dirt cheap anyway. The handiest ones I found to be my 250MB USB ZIP drives (the nice looking blue ones, smaller then the parallel ones).

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Reply 3 of 49, by Stojke

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I had some, but i remember them being horribly slow.
I bought some DLT Tape cartridges 160GB. Will try to find an SCSI device for them.

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Reply 4 of 49, by carlostex

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My super socket 7 system has an internal ATAPI 250MB ZIP and i use it with an USB 250MB connected to my main rig. It's far from being horribly slow if i use 250MB disks. Of course if i use 100MB disks it's gonna be slower, but still much faster than floppy drives.

It's a pretty valid method of transferring data from a more modern rig to a retro machine.

Reply 5 of 49, by PhilsComputerLab

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I had a parallel 100 as a kid. It was great for visiting friends and swapping games 😀

Because you can eject the cartridges during operation it's a great way to transfer information. However most of of my machines have USB and in Windows 98 SE that's also very convenient. Wouldn't mind one for DOS however.

But I heard that there are reliability issues. I never had an issue with my 100 but I read a lot about drives failing.

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Reply 6 of 49, by JayCeeBee64

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I have two Zip 100 drives: an internal IDE for my Socket 7 build and an early external USB (light blue plastic case and large 5V power adapter) for my Pentium 4 and Core i5 builds. Works out great to transfer data between them. Also have about 12 Zip 100 disks that I got back in the late 90's, and so far not a single one has failed (the infamous Click of death that Zip drives became associated with). They are indeed much faster than a floppy drive and more convenient, for me anyway, to use than a CD-RW (I still create CD-RW disks for data transfers well over 100mb).

Ooohh, the pain......

Reply 7 of 49, by joacim

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I had a chance to pick up a box full of Zip 100 and LS120 drives for cheap a while back. I passed, but I regret it now. I always pass on stuff I end up needing/wanting two months later… USB drives are very convenient, but I think mechanical media is cooler. 😀

Reply 9 of 49, by soviet conscript

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Its my personal preferred method to transfer files from a modern PC to anything back to a nec V20 machine without having to setup any kind of network. I try to have one installed in all my systems back to my 386 (my 386 and 486 have internal SCSI versions). for my nec v20 and 286 machines I use external parallel port units.

I just find it super easy to grab a file off the net on my win 7 machine equipped with a USB zip drive, copy it and transfer it to an older system. seems way quicker process then burning a CD as most every file my old machines need is well under 100mb.

Reply 11 of 49, by soviet conscript

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PeterLI wrote:

For me LapLink and CDs work fine.

I never bother with networking for old systems. Saves me an expansion slot. Seems like that would be more of a hassle. Burning a cd for 100mb of data seems wasteful and more of a hassle to me.

Reply 12 of 49, by PhilsComputerLab

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I also prefer sneakernet 😀

I use hard drive bays or just test bench setups and simply shutdown the machine and put the drive into a USB HDD docking station. Or USB. Or if small enough I use the Floppy simulator.

With CDs, just go with CD-RWs, they can be used many times.

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Reply 13 of 49, by pewpewpew

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I too use sneakernet CDRW, but I don't think you can install CDROM on machines this old can you?

soviet conscript wrote:

I try to have one installed in all my systems back to my 386 (my 386 and 486 have internal SCSI versions). for my nec v20 and 286 machines I use external parallel port units.

Reply 15 of 49, by soviet conscript

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PeterLI wrote:

I can pick up CD-ROMs on clearance for less than $.05 each so I do not see it as waste at all. Really convenient actually. 😀

but what of the cost to mother earth 🙁. It just seems writing something to a zip is slightly faster but eh, I guess its not to big of a difference. As for cd drives I never had any issues installing cd drive in 486 and 386 machines. My 286 I had to hunt around for drivers that worked as my usual IDE drivers nor adaptecs SCSI drivers seemed to not work but vide drivers worked fine. I never did it but I know people that got cd drives tuning on 8088 machines. At least external parallel port drives should work.

Reply 16 of 49, by Cloudschatze

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As mentioned, Zip drives can be a great means data transfer/storage, given their ubiquity, and ease of interfacing (parallel, SCSI, USB, Firewire) with systems both old and new. While I have and use CompactFlash with all of my older systems, and generally rely on that as a means of data transport, I've recently begun adding SCSI-based Zip and Jaz drives into the fold as well. Personally, I'm a bigger proponent of the the Winchester-based, more-capable Jaz format, but it's a bit more troublesome to interface with newer systems.

Regarding the "click-of-death" phenomenon, one of the single best resources of information available on the Internet is the research by Steve Gibson, of SpinRite fame:

https://www.grc.com/tip/codfaq1.htm

While Steve lists a number of vague reasons for its occurrence, I'd like to offer my own opinion for at least the intermittent, non-catastrophic variety of "clicking" behavior:

- Media defects and degeneration
- A low tolerance for these defects by earlier Zip drives

Let me provide a case-in-point...

I have three Zip drives of different dates of manufacture: 1997, 1999, and 2000 (the latter being a Zip 250). Up until just recently, I had a single, 100MB Zip disk, of Taiwanese manufacture, and of 1998 vintage. This disk has been rigorously used, and has presented no problems in any of the mentioned drives. To its discredit, this disk happens to be powder blue in color, which just wouldn't do at all.

With a subsequent purchase of ten new disks, whose magnetic medium was manufactured by Belgium-based Sentinel in 2001, I got my first experience with the "clicking" phenomenon. While the two newer drives seem to tolerate these disks well enough, my oldest drive encountered write errors with every single one of them.

Next, I decided to simply try more of what had worked - Taiwanese disks. I bought and received a new three-pack of these, whose magnetic medium was produced by Taiwanese-based MegaMedia in 1996, and again encountered write errors with the oldest drive (but not nearly to the extent experienced with the Belgium-produced disks). Several low-level format attempts later, these disks now appear to work fine in all drives.

Now, up to this point, I'd been using only "Iomega" disks, intentionally avoiding third-party products. This was mostly due to anecdotal accounts, as well as the fact that Steve Gibson, in his Q&A on the matter, states that the media is all the same. Well, guess what? It's not. In fact, Iomega themselves contracted-out the magnetic media production of their own branded disks to at least four different companies.

Of the third-party producers, FujiFilm used (and still uses) a proprietary manufacturing process for their magnetic media known as "ATOMM." Tech and marketing-speak aside, I've now extensively tested two of the FujiFilm disks, whose magnetic media was produced in Japan in 1996, and they perform flawlessly in all of the drives. Guess which Zip disks I'll be using from now on?

Reply 17 of 49, by idspispopd

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I used Zip disks to download stuff at university and carry it home (no broadband yet).
Asides from the normal ATAPI Zip drives there are supposedly also IDE Zip drivers (early revision, they didn't produce those later on). The IDE ones won't need drivers, fully bootable just like hard disks. Disadvantage would probably be not being able to eject the disk easily when in use. I don't know how you would recognize those drives, and I suppose there are not many of them.

Reply 18 of 49, by PhilsComputerLab

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What are the going rates for ZIP drives? What drive would you go for? 100, 250 or 750? USB on the desktop and parallel on the retro PC?

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Reply 19 of 49, by soviet conscript

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philscomputerlab wrote:

What are the going rates for ZIP drives? What drive would you go for? 100, 250 or 750? USB on the desktop and parallel on the retro PC?

I generally try to use the SCSI zip drives in my DOS machines. There a little harder to find but there supposedly a little faster and they use the smaller floppy drive molex connector as opposed to the larger style that the none SCSI drives use.