13 Sep
2013
13 Sep
'13
6:10 a.m.
On Thu, 12 Sep 2013, Jochen Kunz wrote:
On Tue, 10 Sep 2013 19:41:08 +0000
Ian King <IanK at LivingComputerMuseum.org> wrote:
I'm not sure I'd go that far, but DAT drives tend to be higher
maintenance, maybe partly to do with their very small tolerances. I found
for serious work you pretty much had to have an identical spare and you
absolutely had to give them a regular cleaning (drives in their own
external enclosures tended to be easier to maintain, too). For routine
use, a yearly check/alignment is also pretty much mandatory if you want to
be able to read tapes you previously wrote. Still, I don't miss using them
on a regular basis.
I have three external DDS2 DAT drives [...], and
none of them work.
To my experience (and the experience of a lot of other people) thats
usual for DDS drives. Don't waste time or money on them. The one and
only thing you can do with them is moving them to trash bin. Really. A
friend called DDS drives "a spooling /dev/null". They work when new
halfway OK, but fail soon and usual there is no chance to get them back
to work.