mketcham@sdcc13.ucsd.edu (Michelle Ketcham) (04/17/91)
I am considering buying a Syquest removable hard drive which I
would like to put in the 5 1/4 drive bay on my A2000. As this would
be my first hard drive, I will need a scsi controller. Does it
matter which controller I get? Does anyone have any experience with
this drive or any advice on whether or not this is a good idea? (I
have been told that a "normal" hard drive would be better as my
first drive and a removable one would be a good second drive) I'm
kind of looking at the removable drive from an economic standpoint
(i.e. This would be my only drive and yet I could buy several
cartridges and, in essence, have a 88 or 132 meg capacity hard
drive.)
Any comments or suggestions (posted or emailed) will be greatly
appreciated.
Thanks, Michelle
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Michelle Ketcham mketcham@sdcc13.ucsd.edumetahawk@itsgw.rpi.edu (Wayne G Rigby) (04/18/91)
In article <18360@sdcc6.ucsd.edu> mketcham@sdcc13.ucsd.edu (Michelle Ketcham) writes: > > I am considering buying a Syquest removable hard drive which I >would like to put in the 5 1/4 drive bay on my A2000. As this would >be my first hard drive, I will need a scsi controller. Does it >matter which controller I get? Does anyone have any experience with >this drive or any advice on whether or not this is a good idea? (I >have been told that a "normal" hard drive would be better as my >first drive and a removable one would be a good second drive) I'm >kind of looking at the removable drive from an economic standpoint >(i.e. This would be my only drive and yet I could buy several >cartridges and, in essence, have a 88 or 132 meg capacity hard >drive.) > > Any comments or suggestions (posted or emailed) will be greatly >appreciated. > > Thanks, Michelle > > >-- >_______________________________________________________________________________ > Michelle Ketcham mketcham@sdcc13.ucsd.edu Yes, you will need a controller. A few companies sell internal versions of the Syquest for the A2000 which come with controllers. (Check with the company you're ordering from.) If you get one without a controller, C='s A2091 is a fast controller, but it doesn't support hard drives that can be "removed." There is a hack (DISKCHANGE?) that would allow you to change cartridges. Another problem you'll bump into is if you boot off one of the cartridges, you really won't be able to change it without rebooting. Everytime you remove the boot up cartridge, and do just about anything that hasn't been made resident, you'll get a request to reinsert the boot up disk. So unless you boot off of floppies, you'll only be able to access one 44Meg cartridge. Yes, these make great 2nd hard drives, but I've used a Syquest as a main drive on a Mac and was not inconvenienced much at all. You might also consider the Ricoh removable media drive. GVP sells it. It's very similar to the Syquest, except that the cartridges hold about 50Megs and you can't accidentally insert the cartridges in the wrong way (really not a big problem, just possible). It's a little more expensive, but the cartridges are priced well; unfortunately, I don't think there is an internal version, yet. Wayne Rigby Computer and Systems Engineer (in training) Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute metahawk@rpi.edu
am66@cunixa.cc.columbia.edu (Alexander Maldutis) (04/19/91)
In article <18360@sdcc6.ucsd.edu> mketcham@sdcc13.ucsd.edu (Michelle Ketcham) writes: > > I am considering buying a Syquest removable hard drive which I >would like to put in the 5 1/4 drive bay on my A2000. As this would >be my first hard drive, I will need a scsi controller. Does it >matter which controller I get? Does anyone have any experience with >this drive or any advice on whether or not this is a good idea? (I >have been told that a "normal" hard drive would be better as my >first drive and a removable one would be a good second drive) I'm >kind of looking at the removable drive from an economic standpoint >(i.e. This would be my only drive and yet I could buy several >cartridges and, in essence, have a 88 or 132 meg capacity hard >drive.) > > Any comments or suggestions (posted or emailed) will be greatly >appreciated. > > Thanks, Michelle > > >-- >_______________________________________________________________________________ > Michelle Ketcham mketcham@sdcc13.ucsd.edu I recently got a Ricoh 50meg (46meg formatted) removable drive, and would recommend it over the SyQuest, mainly because of reliability. Either the ICD controller or the GVP Series II would work well; the ICD is faster but hogs more CPU time. I don't have firsthand experience with the GVP, but most say it's pretty good, as well. As for the first/second drive question, if this is your only drive, by all means get the removable - it is slower than a "real" drive, but the idea of infinte storage is great - use the thing as a floppy! In terms of cost effectiveness, it depends how many cartridges you will buy - if it is only 2 or 3, then you are better off getting a 150meg drive - but if you expect to buy 6 or so, the removable becomes cheaper than a similar 300 meg drive. These are quick reflections; please e-mail if you need more info. ****************************************************************************** HA HA! YOU THINK THIS IS THE REAL .SIGNATURE? IT IS! Total Computing!**********************************am66@cunixa.cc.columbia.edu*