🚀 go-pugleaf

ee91mds2@brunel.ac.uk (Mark D Smith) writes:

>I am looking to buy a removable mass storage system to replace my ever
>growing collection of floppies and to backup my two 40MByte hard disks. I
>have been looking at various options, including flopticals and syquest
>drives and, at the moment, a 44MByte syquest drive looks to be the best
>solution.

The nice thing about flopticals is that they handle all the useful 3.5"
magnetic floppies too. The only thing that gets in the way of replacing the
standard floppy drive with a floptical is that some software is locked
by accessing the floppy drive directly. Of course, an internal SCSI
interface is also necessary. I am wondering if a module that redefines
SWI ADFS_DiscOP would be enough to solve the software lock problem.
Floptical drive mechanisms are available for $275 and the 21MB disks cost
reasonable so it looks like a viable option.

For more $$$ rewritable optical drives look interesting. Once the drive is
paid for, the media costs $25 per 128 MB (3.5") or somewhat more but cheaper
per MB for 650 MB media. The data on optical disks decays slower than on
magnetic disks, so is good for relatively long-term storage.

When the market catches up with the technology (I mean when we can look back
on the technology that is available today), the best data storage is 3D
optical RAM. After all, we are still in the dark ages.

--
Adam David. (adamd²@rhi.hi.is)

In article <5593@krafla.rhi.hi.is>, adamd@rhi.hi.is (Adam David) writes:
> ee91mds2@brunel.ac.uk (Mark D Smith) writes:

[cut] 

>  The data on optical disks decays slower than on
> magnetic disks, so is good for relatively long-term storage.
> 

Umm, this last statement is dependent on how long you leave a magnetic disc
beside a montior or in the sun. If you do neither, and store the disc out of 
harm's way, then I'd almost say the optical disc would decay (slightly) faster 
(dust particles get in the grooves (altering the defractive properties of the 
medium) and the plastic cracks with old age e.t.c...)

Has anyone done any experiments to determine which decays faster?



		From Martin Glanvill	(mcg@waikato.ac.nz)

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In article <5593@krafla.rhi.hi.is>, adamd@rhi.hi.is (Adam David) writes:

> The nice thing about flopticals is that they handle all the useful 3.5"
> magnetic floppies too. 

I have heard it said that flopticals are unable to handle
high density disks (eg 1.4M DOS disks).  Can anyone clarify
this?   I am tossing up between Syquest and Flopticals.
The ability to read/write 1.4M disks from work could swing
the balance.

NB I have RISCOS3.1 on a 420 (in case that is relevant)

Andrew Black

In article <1992Nov19.195618.364@logica.co.uk> blacka@logica.co.uk writes:
>In article <5593@krafla.rhi.hi.is>, adamd@rhi.hi.is (Adam David) writes:
>
>> The nice thing about flopticals is that they handle all the useful 3.5"
>> magnetic floppies too. 
>
>I have heard it said that flopticals are unable to handle
>high density disks (eg 1.4M DOS disks).  Can anyone clarify
>this?   I am tossing up between Syquest and Flopticals.
>The ability to read/write 1.4M disks from work could swing
>the balance.
>
>NB I have RISCOS3.1 on a 420 (in case that is relevant)
>
>Andrew Black

	Well, according to _Archimedes World_ none of the floptical drives available
for the arc at this time can cope with normal magnetic media. Bit of a bummer really.
Although I must admit the source of this information isn't exactly famous for accuracy...


	Doug.

In article <1992Nov19.195618.364@logica.co.uk> blacka@logica.co.uk writes:

>I have heard it said that flopticals are unable to handle
>high density disks (eg 1.4M DOS disks).  Can anyone clarify
>this?   I am tossing up between Syquest and Flopticals.
>The ability to read/write 1.4M disks from work could swing
>the balance.

They can read ANY linear disk (ie  not low density Mac) WITH THE
EXCEPTION of Archimedes disks.

However, I'm not sure if anybody's filers actually cope with
PC disks yet (they didn't last time I looked).  The problem
with reading Arch disks may or  may not be resolved - it's
in Acorn's  hands (although it's  not their fault - just
Insite being awkward).

I suggest you call Morley or The Serial Port and find  out
how  far they've  got with their respective filers.

Cheers

Bob


-- 
  Robert J. Voisey  :  r_voisey@csd.uwe.ac.uk
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