Horun wrote on 2021-05-16, 23:24:

I will dig thru my software archives over the next week or so. Have some tape backup software that I used with a SCSI Travan 400Mb tape drive years ago

Thanks, I appreciate it.

BitWrangler wrote on 2021-05-17, 02:20:

So anyone who has never used a tape drive before, be aware they take hours to do anything.

I'd be happy if this thing worked at all. I have a thing for IBM so I didn't buy it to actually use it as a backup drive. I just need more hands-on experience with SCSI.

Will any SCSI-1 interface card work with this drive? Some of them have BIOS ROMs and others don't.

Miphee wrote on 2021-05-17, 17:00:

Will any SCSI-1 interface card work with this drive? Some of them have BIOS ROMs and others don't.

you only need the bios to be able to boot from a device, so no bios required...
unless you want to boot from that tape drive 🤣
(in which case you'll need a very special tape-boot enabled scsi bios rom for the card you'll be using)

Now that would be interesting. 😁

BIOS is always a good idea. You can already see at the boot screen if your drive is detected and dont need to boot an OS or install a driver for the SCSI-Adapter. Your tape drive should also be listed in the BIOS screen.

The problem is availability, SCSI-1 cards are pretty rare here so I have to work with what I get.

Miphee wrote on 2021-05-17, 17:32:

The problem is availability, SCSI-1 cards are pretty rare here so I have to work with what I get.

SCSI tends to be backwards compatible so, you can also go for a High end 64bit PCI-X 266MHz SCSI controller (allthough maybe not that high in specs) and hook the tape drive up to that with the necessary plug converters adapters/cables.

I just got an Ultra-SCSI card, would that work too?

yes, and since it's narrow scsi, should be easy enough to find a cable that goes from the 50 pin connector to the centronics one.

Could you show me some pics of such a cable?

Miphee wrote on 2021-05-17, 19:14:

Could you show me some pics of such a cable?

No, but the internet can after a quick google.

google SCSI 50 pin to centronics

Thanks, I didn't know SCSI-1 (that was made in the 80's) worked with Ultra-SCSI (~2003).

I used a Adaptec 2940 for my old Tape drive, had to set the bus speed/transfer rate to 5Mb or 10Mb (which ever was lowest on the card) for it's device ID# in the SCSI BIOS for best operation, still do that on older slow SCSI cdroms too.....