21 Apr
1997
21 Apr
'97
12:12 p.m.
On Mon, 21 Apr 1997, Roger Merchberger wrote:
They are handy, but they're still expensive for
storage. For around $50 (or
I think less), you can pick up a 1.3G magneto optical platter - That's
roughly 4 cents per meg! Granted, the drive runs around $600, but it's
worth it! (also, it's a flippy media, but hey! You'll still swap less than
a Zip!)
Actually, I don't use the Zip disks much for long-term archiving -- I
count on redundant systems for my real data -- why should I back up
operating systems and application packages (other than configuration
files) when I've got the installation media and it'll be upgraded or
superceded in a few months anyway. I mostly use them for moving my
real stuff between those redundant systems as well as the desktop at
work that I use most for sucking stuff off of the net, as the T-1
there is better than the 28.8 at home when pulling down a couple of
hundred meg of fresh Linux material.
Don't get me wrong... I have a SCSI zip
(that's the *only* way to go.. the
Parallel port is _just_ _too_ _slow!_) and I do like it... but for mass
storage that will last 30 years around kids with magnets, MO is awesome!
Well, ours are both parallel since one of the main ideas was to use
them to move material between mostly PC compatibles running Linux, OS/2
and (mostly Lisa's) Microslough-based machines. And Lisa actually is
using them to backup her systems. I'm still designing my next power
system, and at present we have only one system with a real SCSI
interface -- my new power system will have one as well. (The box it's
being built into is an old AT&T 6386E tower box with enough room to
put in any damn thing I want -- I won't throw away the old CPU and ESDI
drives though, as eventually [it's ten years old next year] I'll want
to restore the machine as a classic).
Oh, and Linux is still a lot easier on the storage
than Win95! 64K clusters
-- Bah! ;^>
Not the way I do it -- I tend to put _everything_ on my hard disk, even
the contents of the Red Hat Linux Library CD. It's amazing how much
space years of documentation and source changes takes up. Plus my main
Linux system provides overflow storage via UUCP for all of the material
that doesn't fit on my old Tandy Xenix and AT&T 3B1 systems (both
discontinued about 1986 and therefore on-topic in this mailing list, in
case anyone was getting impatient with the discussion of newfangled
stuff like Linux and Zip drives -- Linux allows us to extend the
capabilities of those classics and I know that there is an attempt in
progress to adapt the Zip to the 3B1).
--
Ward Griffiths
"Men will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails
of the last priest." [Denis Diderot, "Dithyrambe sur la fete de rois"]