Wanted: tech docs on original Iomega 8-inch full height 10MB Bernoulli drive (Alpha-10)

[Ian Primus]

I can confirm that the media is starting to degrade - at least, it
does if it wasn't stored properly. I have a couple of cartridges here
that are shedding badly. You can manually open the cartridge by
tripping the catches and sliding the door open, and look at it. Here's
a picture of such a shedding/unusable cartridge after an attempt to
read it:
https://i.imgur.com/Pb4AyQo.jpg
The oxide clogs the heads up pretty good - it's vital to keep the
heads clean and to inspect cartridges before using them so you don't
gunk them up. Look for dull/chalky looking media. Obviously any mold
spots are bad as well. And if you do get a bunch of read errors
(clunking noise), be sure to check and clean the heads before using a
good cartridge. I'm not sure if the oxide buildup will damage
otherwise good media, but I can't help but think it might.

I do have a fully working 10MB drive and controller, and the ability
to image cartridges.

I'd love to find more actual technical documentation on these drives
as well, everything I know about them is from getting mine to run. I'm
also always looking for more cartridges.

-Ian
On Sun, Oct 14, 2018 at 9:59 PM Michael Brutman via cctalk
<cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
>
> Hi Eric,
>
> I have working 10MB and 20MB units here being driven by a PC XT with the
> Iomega specific card for them.
>
> I've had to puts lots of effort into cleaning the heads on them.  I'm not
> sure if there is an oxide shedding problem or just 30 years of dust that
> I'm fighting, but they do seem to be very finicky at this stage.  It also
> could be a media formatting problem; I think they have servo tracks that
> were laid down at manufacturing time, so if you have a read error on the
> servo track there is no way to fix it.
>
>
> Mike
>
>
> On Fri, Oct 12, 2018 at 9:34 AM Eric Smith via cctalk <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
> wrote:
>
> > Does anyone have the user, technical and/or service manual for the original
> > 10MB Iomega Bernoulli drives? Bitsavers has the manuals for the later
> > half-height 10.0/10.5 MB "Alpha-10H", but I'm looking for docs for the
> > original model, which was full-height with a SASI (pre-SCSI) interface.
> >
> > I have the drives, about 20 cartridges that I want to image, and some
> > additional scratch cartridges.
> >
> > I've never used Bernoulli drives before. These drives and cartridges were
> > last used around 1986. I'll disconnect and test the power supply before
> > powering up the actual drives, but is there anything else I should be
> > concerned with?
> >
> > Does anyone have known-working 8-inch Bernoulli drives?
> >