IOMEGA ZIP DRIVE - Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) Version 1.4 Compilation, general info, and Mac info by steveg@phantom.com PC info by lee@library.ucsb.edu (Not in any way associated with Iomega) Thanks to wjabi@libra.arch.umich.edu pbp@mindspring.com kb03@swt.edu guymc@evansville.net folta@netcom.com keithj@unr.edu nmehl@near.net bbennett@unixg.ubc.ca lisa@gordian.com hueichin@macc.wisc.edu ...and others This FAQ attempts to answer many common questions and clarify many misconceptions about the Iomega Zip drive, one of the most innovative and viable secondary storage and backup devices to come on to the Mac scene in a very long time. Additions, addendums, corrections, or further questions can be submitted to steveg@phantom.com. In no way whatsoever am I to be held responsible for errors or omissions in this FAQ that could lead to further misconceptions, problems, data loss, conflicting issues or (for whatever reasons) sudden death. Use this FAQ at your own risk. - - - - - ***NEW IN THIS VERSION... * By popular demand! Zip drive information for PC clones; * Most of the spelling should now be correct, so stop bugging me; * Zip vs EZ135-Which is better?; * Where this FAQ is posted and how to get your questions answered; * Outside USA Zip considerations; * More valiant attempts at making this thing more legible. - - - - - NOTE: Unless specified otherwise, all transfer rates and access times listed throughout this FAQ are in reference to the SCSI version of the Zip drive. - - - - - ***INFORMATION AT A GLANCE... SIZE OF ZIP DRIVE: Approximately 7" long by 5.25" wide by 1.5" high LENGTH OF SCSI CABLE: 3' (three feet) SIZE OF POWER SUPPLY: 3.25"x2.5"x2.25" (see ASCII diagram) 2.5" __|___ / /| 3.25"- / / | / / | /_____/ / | | /| 2.25"- |__O__|/ LENGTH OF POWER CABLE: 6' (six feet) CURRENT CAPACITY: 100-MB cartridges store 94.1-MB after formatting 25-MB cartridges expected to ship soon TRANSFER SPEED: See chart near bottom of FAQ. PRESS RATINGS: MacWeek (unknown issue date), 5 stars (5=top rating) MacWorld (July 1995), 4 stars (5=top rating) MacUser (July 1995), 4.5 stars (5=top rating) - - - - - This FAQ is posted on an as-needed and as-completed basis to the following newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.hardware comp.sys.mac.hardware.storage comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage comp.arch.storage comp.sys.atari.st.tech comp.sys.atari.8bit comp.sys.amiga.hardware If you have a Zip-related question which you'd like to see directly addressed in this FAQ, please send mail to the appropriate users. For Mac Q&A...............steveg@phantom.com For PC Q&A................lee@library.ucsb.edu (who will forward the answer to me for inclusion in the next edition of the FAQ) For all other platforms...Until we get appropriate "Zip Gurus" on other platforms, post questions to your local usenet newsgroup(s) that relate to your platform. - - - - - Q: What is the Zip drive? A: The Zip drive is a new drive from Iomega Corporation, makers of the Bernoulli line of removable storage devices (SyQuest's primary competition in that field). The drive uses proprietary cartridges providing 100-MB unformatted storage capacity (25-MB cartridges are expected to be released soon). The drive was first advertised in the catalog pages of MacWarehouse (a popular mail order company) several months before the drive began shipping. As a result, a huge backorder was created even before the first drives began trickling out. After the drives began shipping in earnest, other mail order companies and local retailers began advertising and selling them. Waiting periods ranged from a few days to over a month, depending on which vendor you ordered from and exactly when you ordered. The drive itself is rather small (slightly larger than the typical Supra modem), and weighs less than one pound (including disk). The case is a cheap-feeling but reasonably sturdy dark blue plastic affair with six gray rubber feet attached, allowing the drive to be set flat (like a typical modem) or on edge. A green LED on the front of the drive indicates that the drive has power, while an orange LED next to it acts as a busy light. A small round gray button is set below the two LEDs and acts as an emergency eject button. (When the drive is connected to the Mac, the disk is automatically ejected like a floppy disk when the disk icon is dragged to the trash can. If for some reason you have a disk installed and the computer is not turned on, for example, pressing the button on the drive will eject the disk.) A clear plastic window is on the top of the drive allowing the user to see the label of an inserted disk. The back of the drive has two 25-pin SCSI connectors. Between the two connectors are two switches; one allows the user to set the drive between SCSI ID 5 and 6 (those are the only two options available), while the other provides termination (ON if the Zip is the last device on the SCSI chain, OFF if there are devices on either side of the SCSI chain). The power inlet is located on the side of the drive (on the same side that would face down if the drive were positioned on its side) and provides both a recessed power connector and a recessed power cable guide for aesthetically routing the power cord. The drive ships with an external two-prong power supply (which weighs slightly more than the drive itself!), one 100-MB "Zip Tools" cartridge containing many excellent utilities for formatting, indexing and backing up your data, two floppy disks for installation (one for Mac, one for PC), a thin but complete owner's manual, a shielded 25-to-25 pin SCSI cable, and the usual assortment of promotional goodies. Setting up the drive takes only a few minutes. Q: What's the deal with the cartridges? A: As of this writing, only 100-MB cartridges are shipping. Each cartridge has an unformatted capacity of 100-MB; after formatting, they provide about 95-MB of storage capacity. Cartridges cost between $15 and $25 apiece depending on vendor and quantity purchased. Each cartridge measures about 3.875" square and are about .25" thick. They come in a hard clear plastic fold-out case, similar to a magneto-optical disk. The cartridges are prelabeled; replacement labels are available from Iomega for a rather pricey $3 for a package of 10. Iomega plans to have 25-MB cartridges available soon. Cartridges can be formatted with just about any SCSI formatting utility, including Hard Disk Toolkit, Silverlining, and Drive7. No significant performance or capacity differences were noted between using the different formatting utilities. (Golden Triangle's TimesTwo utility can be successfully used to format the disks for the Mac to an artificial 200-MB each, but all things considered, this isn't a smart idea for many reasons.) Q: How fast is the drive? A: Like any SCSI device, overall performance will vary depending on what system and configuration is used. (The drive will, of course, work with any Mac with a SCSI port on it, which includes every Mac from the Mac Plus forward.) On my system (Mac IIci w/33Mhz DayStar Turbo 040i, 32-MB physical RAM, System 7.5.1, about one row of extensions on a 24-bit 1024x768 monitor), Speedometer 4.0 gives the drive a rating of .794, which is slightly faster than the Performantz 44-MB SyQuest drive that I tested as a comparison device (and gave a rating of .736). This is fast enough to run most software; QuickTime movies run quite smoothly from Zip disks, as do sampled sounds and similar time-specific files. (See more detailed ratings at the bottom of this FAQ.) Q: Does the Zip drive use Bernoulli technology? A: No, not at all. The Zip drive is a sort of hybrid of modern drive assembly techniques and established Winchester-type drive mechanisms. The Bernoulli Effect, and the technology that Iomega applies to it, is not to be found in this drive. Q: It's such a new drive...How does it rate in terms of quality? A: Only time will tell for that, of course. It is my personal feeling, and the overwhelming feeling of most of the Zip owners on the internet, that the Zip drive is quite solid and reliable. I've personally put about two hundred consecutive hours of access time on my Zip drive and had nary a single problem. I've transported the drive in a plain plastic grocery bag to work and back (a half hour New York walk) and hadn't had a problem with it. The drive is tightly constructed, though some may think it feels cheap. (My drive survived numerous leg-bumps while walking to and from work and survived without a single scratch.) Q: Will the Zip drive work with System 7's virtual memory? A: Like all other removable storage devices, no, it will not work. I understand, however, that other virtual memory programs exist which can use removable storage devices (and, as such, the Zip drive) as VM storage, but that's a subject for another FAQ. :-) Q: Can you boot a Mac from a Zip disk? A: Yes, you can. There are two ways to accomplish this. (The following instructions assume that you have a Zip disk with the proper System software installed on it.) First, when the computer is up and running, insert a Zip disk. Open the "Startup Disk" control panel and select the Zip disk as your startup disk. While holding down the OPTION key, select RESTART from the SPECIAL menu; holding down OPTION prevents the Zip disk from being ejected. (If for some reason the Zip disk IS ejected after you select RESTART, simply reinsert the Zip disk BEFORE the "happy Mac" icon comes up and you'll be in business.) The second way is a bit different and assumes that your computer is turned off, but the startup disk is the hard drive you usually boot from. Power up your Zip and insert the Zip disk. Boot your Mac while holding down the SHIFT, COMMAND, OPTION, and DELETE keys; this forces your Mac to bypass the internal hard drive and should cause your Mac to boot right from the Zip disk. Q: What if I want to buy one Zip drive for use on several different machines? A: Well, if they're all Macs, you're set. Just install the Zip Tools software on each machine and off you go. Of course, you'll need to physically move the Zip drive from one Mac to another as well. If you're dealing with a mixed Mac and PC environment, your options change. If your PC has a SCSI card you can plug the Zip drive into it, install the PC Zip Tools, and away you go. If you don't have a SCSI card on your PC, Iomega offers a ZIP SCSI adapter for $60 (Iomega part #10013). If you don't want SCSI on your PC, you can buy the parallel version of the Zip drive. It offers all the same features of the SCSI Zip drive, but it interfaces with the more common parallel connectors on PC's. If you're looking to use the Zip drive on other platforms, the SCSI drive is probably the way you'd want to go. Since the Zip SCSI performs just like any other SCSI device, it should work on such platforms as an Amiga, Atari ST series, NeXT, and Sun workstations. It has been confirmed by others that the SCSI Zip drive works flawlessly on Atari 8-bit w/SCSI interface and Amiga computers. The hardware interface is easy; connect it as you would any other SCSI device. The potential problem lies in the Zip Tools software. Iomega packages the Zip drive with Zip Tools for Mac and PC running Windows (they also offer the Zip Tools package for OS/2; this disk costs an additional $20 and is Iomega part #10045). If you want to run the Zip on another computer, it's up to you to come up with formatting and mounting software. (On the Atari 8-bit series, it has been reported that SpartaDOS works perfectly with the Zip drive.) Q: Will it work with a PowerBook? A: Absolutely! However, you'll need to invest in an HDI-SCSI adapter; Iomega sells this for $20 and is part #10042. Other manufacturers sell this type of adapter at comparable prices. Q: What other goodies are offered with Zip? A: A small color brochure is included with the drive selling such items as carrying cases, Zip disk holders, extra Zip disks (which are more expensive than mail order and some retail outlets), Zip disk labels, Zip SCSI cables, the aforementioned PowerBook adapter, power supplies, Zip SCSI cards, and Zip Tools for the three mentioned platforms. It is mentioned in the Zip documentation that a Zip drive cleaning kit is offered through Iomega; however, there is no evidence of this kit in the color brochure. (Note that the Zip drive CANNOT be cleaned with a conventional floppy drive cleaning kit, so don't try it!) Q: Any other things, good or bad, that I should know? A: There are some issues which some people find fault with which I'll point out here. First, the drive has no POWER switch. When the drive is plugged into an active electrical outlet, it's on; when it's unplugged, it's off. I personally have no problem with this as my drive is plugged into a switchable power station (Kensington MasterPiece Plus; no affiliation, though I think this is an excellent unit) and I can turn it off and on with the station's button. The drive also has only two SCSI ID options (5 and 6), which means that if you have a relatively full SCSI chain, you may find yourself switching the ID's of other devices on the chain. As was previously stated, the drive has two 25-pin SCSI connectors and ships with a 25-to-25 pin SCSI cable. For most users with multiple SCSI devices, this means that the Zip drive will be the first drive on the SCSI chain and other devices will plug into the Zip drive. If you happen to have a spare 50-to-25 pin SCSI cable, you can place the Zip drive on the end of the SCSI chain (thus eliminating the need for external terminators, since the Zip has switchable termination) by connecting the 50-pin end to your formerly-last SCSI device the the 25-pin end to the Zip drive. This is NOT to say that the Zip drive couldn't be placed in the middle of your SCSI chain. It certainly can; the only thing you'd need to accomplish this is the appropriate SCSI cables (25-to-25 and/or 25-to-50, depending on your other devices). The drive is VERY quiet. For some, this is a blessing; for others, a curse. The drive makes a quiet (library-level) clicking sound as the read/write heads move across the disk, but that's about it. Do not rely on auditory feedback to determine the status of the Zip drive. :-) The drive also has a power saving mode. When the drive is not accessed for a few minutes, the drive kicks down into a low-power mode. When the drive needs to be accessed while in low-power mode, it only takes about a second for the drive to get back into action (considerably less time than it takes for a PowerBook's hard drive to spin back up). When inserting a disk, there is no lengthly spin-up time like a SyQuest drive so the disk is almost instantly available. When a disk is ejected, there is no spin-down time so the disk ejects at least as fast (if not faster) than a floppy disk, and leaves the drive with a very solid and satisfying "ker-CHUNK" sound. Q: I want more information and, gee-golly-gosh-darn-it, this FAQ just isn't enough! How can I get in touch with the folks who make the Zip? A: It turns out that there's a whole lot of different ways you can contact Iomega. If you're still living in the Stone Age (or, perhaps more appropriately, the Stamp Age), you can write them: Iomega Corporate Office, Iomega Corporation, 1821 West Iomega Way, Roy, Utah 84067-9977, USA. The voice telephone number for their corporate offices is 801-778-1000, but DON'T call there unless absolutely necessary. Iomega has been smart enough to supply about half a dozen alternative telephone resources. An Interactive Voice Help system (24 hours) is available at 1-800-456-5522 (or 801-778-3000 if you're in the area code). Sales Information is at 1-800-MY-STUFF (1-800-697-8899). An automated FAX assistance system (US and Canada only; 24 hours) is at 801-778-5763. But wait! There's more! Iomega operates a BBS at 801-392-9819. They're on CompuServe (Mac users type "GO MACCVEN", PC users type "GO PCVENE") and America Online (keyword "IOMEGA"), and they have an internet email address at info@iomega.com. Finally (?), they operate a Web page at http://www.iomega.com/. Whew! - - - - - TRAVEL WITH YOUR ZIP DRIVE A LOT? READ THIS! Q: Is the Zip drive available with a power supply of 220/240 vaults so that it will work in other countries? A: Yes and no. By itself, the Zip drive ships with a USA-standard power supply which can't be used everywhere around the world. However, Iomega sells a "Universal Power Supply" (item #10044) for $40 which, according to Iomega documentation is "smaller, lighter, and usable worldwide". I've received some reports from several people who state that this power supply works in several different countries. Zip owners in the USA who travel within the country with their Zip drive may want to consider this power supply as it is indeed smaller and lighter than the standard power supply (almost half the size, in fact) and would make portability that much easier. Q: Does that "Universal Power Supply" include all ten billion adapters to fit the various electrical outlets of the world? A: No idea. The person I spoke with at Iomega told me that he thinks it includes several different adapters, but isn't positive. - - - - - GOT A PC CLONE? THIS IS THE STUFF YOU'LL WANT TO PAY PARTICULAR ATTENTION TO! Q: What's a Zip Drive-SCSI for PC? A: Well, it's the same thing as a Zip drive for Mac. Depending on your SCSI interface, it should be about the same speed. Iomega sells an inexpensive ($54) SCSI card for the Zip drive called the Zip Zoom (see below). The software for both Macs and Windows ships with the drive; if you're using OS/2, you'll need to purchase the Zip Tools software separately from Iomega for $20. Q: What's this Zip Zoom SCSI adapter all about? A: It's a SCSI-1 ISA card based on the Adaptec 1505 and has an external 25-pin SCSI connector. It doesn't have an internal SCSI connector, but it does seem to allow you to chain other SCSI devices off of it either before or after your Zip drive. If you want SCSI-2 or a bus-master card (?) then you may want to buy a different SCSI card. Infoworld (5-1-95) reports backing up 397-MB in 57 minutes (6.97-MB/minute) and restoring that same data in 27 minutes (14.7-MB/minute) with the Zip Zoom adapter. Q: What about booting a DOS/Windows machine from the Zip drive? A: That depends on your SCSI adapter. The Zip Zoom doesn't support booting from the Zip drive, though other SCSI cards may. Q: Can I use the Zip Drive for both my PC and my Mac? A: Yes. In fact, Iomega ships the drive with floppies for both Macs and PCs, but there's a catch. As soon as you run the program to install the Zip Tools utilities that are included on the Zip Tools disk, the installer will erase the partition (about 50-MB) of the system that you are NOT installing it for. (So if you run the install program from a Mac, it erases the DOS partition and vice versa.) Iomega's official position is that you have to buy a second Zip Tools disk if you want to install on both platforms. Q: That sucks! How can we get Zip Tools installed on both the Mac AND the PC without forking over more dough? A: Apparently the installer doesn't delete the other system's tools until you actually RUN the installer. The workaround is to run the Guest program to mount the disk, then use a disk duplication program (that gets the whole disk, sector by sector) to dupe the Zip Tools disk. Some people have reported doing this successfully with the Disk Duplicator program that is on the Macintosh partition of the Zip Tools. Once you have a duplicate of the Zip Tools disk, you can use one to install for your Mac, and then the other to install for your DOS/Windows machine. Q: I already installed it for one platform, and now I can't install for the other. Help! A: If you have America Online, go to Iomega's SIG (keyword: iomega). The files are available in the PC Utilities section of their software library: ZIPTOOLS.EXE ....part one of the Zip Tools package for PC FIND.EXE ........part two of the Zip Tools package for PC IOSCSI.EXE ......Iomega SCSI drivers, including the Zip Disk drivers, for PC Zip Tools version 4.2.1 .....the whole Zip Tools package for Mac Q: Ok, I downloaded the files that I need. Now what? A: Those are self-extracting files, so for god's sake, be careful! Make a directory called \ZIPTOOLS, move the ZIPTOOLS.EXE file in there and run it from that directory. Make a subdirectory \ZIPTOOLS\FINDIT, move FIND.EXE into it, then run that (from the FINDIT subdirectory). For further instructions, read the README.NOW file in the \ZIPTOOLS directory. To install the SCSI drivers, make a directory called \IOMEGA, and move the IOSCSI.EXE file there. Now run it from that directory. Run MANUAL.EXE and read how to install it. You can use the INSTALL program or do it manually. Q: My PC doesn't have a SCSI adapter. What do I do? A: You can either buy a SCSI adapter (from Iomega or from somewhere else) and run with it, or you can buy the Zip Drive-Parallel, which is (obviously) a Zip drive that plugs into a PC's parallel port. Q: How fast is it? A: According to the readme.txt file, the transfer speed for standard parallel port is 2-6 MB/minute, bi-directional parallel port is 6-17MB/minute, and enhanced parallel port is 17-22/minute. Q: No, really, how fast is it in Real Life? A: Huei-Chin Lin reports: I had transferred a 12-MB zipped file from my Zip-disk to my hard drive, and roughly timing it. It took about a minute to transfer a 12-MB file from Zip disk to my hard drive. (My computer is 486DX2-50 with 8-MB RAM.) I had even zipped my whole window directory and subdirectories to my Zip disk, and it is only a bit slower than the speed I've got when I zipped the same thing to my hard drive (remember that I was using EPP capacities and I only tested it without any benchmarking). Q: Why would I want a parallel version instead of a faster SCSI version? A: Well, not all PC's have SCSI adapters and you may not want one, so the parallel drive would be for you. Other than that, it's a matter of personal preference. - - - - - CONFIRMED: Power Computing, the first licensed and authorized manufacturer of Macintosh clones, is working with Iomega to provide an internal Zip drive for the Power Computing clones; Iomega has verified this and has publicly stated that they're working on an internal version for end-user installation in other machines. Power Computing has said that if/when the Zip drive becomes available (as optional equipment) on their clones, it will be (paraphrased) "at a substantially lower price" than the external Zip drive. Figuring that about half of the Zip's cost comes from the case and power supply, it is my opinion that it would be quite possible to see Power Computing offer the Zip drive as a $100 option. CONFIRMED: Iomega is working on a larger capacity removable storage drive currently code named "Viper". The Viper drive is expected to cost ~$500 for the internal version (~$600 external) and use ~$100 3.5" cartridges that hold 1.3-GB apiece. Iomega is denying everything except that they are indeed working on a "larger capacity drive" for future distribution. - - - - - Many people had requested more solid reference numbers to compare the SCSI Zip drive with other types of storage devices. Okay; here ya go. These results were obtained using Norton Utilities 3.1's "System Info" program on an accelerated Mac IIci (DayStar Turbo 040i @ 33Mhz) with 32-MB RAM (real RAM) running System 7.5.1 and with no non-System-7.5 extensions loaded except for the Iomega Driver; disk cache was set to 256K. The IIci's hard drive and the SyQuest were formatted with Silverlining 5.54/23; the Zip was formatted using Iomega Tools 4.2. Note that specific results will vary a bit from machine to machine due to CPU speed, system configuration, specific architecture, etc. MAC IIci HD ZIP-100 44-MB SYQUEST RANDOM READ: 116K/sec 38.5K/sec 37.3K/sec 1K SEQUENTIAL READ: 382.3K/sec 47.1K/sec 51.9K/sec 4K SEQUENTIAL READ: 757K/sec 171K/sec 165K/sec 16K SEQUENTIAL READ: 999K/sec 491K/sec 361K/sec 64K SEQUENTIAL READ: 1010K/sec 927K/sec 516K/sec 256K SEQUENTIAL READ: 1099K/sec 1186K/sec 579K/sec RANDOM WRITE: 71.1K/sec 38.9K/sec 36.1K/sec 1K SEQUENTIAL WRITE: 72.0K/sec 47K/sec 48.8K/sec 4K SEQUENTIAL WRITE: 253K/sec 171K/sec 158K/sec 16K SEQUENTIAL WRITE: 695K/sec 491K/sec 356K/sec 64K SEQUENTIAL WRITE: 986K/sec 926K/sec 511K/sec 256K SEQUENTIAL WRITE: 1216K/sec 1189K/sec 579K/sec More information that may be useful... * The Zip drive and its cartridges _are_not_compatible_ with any other media or drive. A Zip drive cannot read/write/format/recognize magneto-optical disks, floppy disks, or any other sort of non-Zip media. * Unconfirmed but several people have mentioned this to me: MS-DOS formatted Zip disks seem to be in more plentiful supply than Mac formatted Zip disks, presumably because the Zip drive isn't making as big a splash in the PC world since they have never had as strong a deficit of low-cost, high-capacity secondary storage devices. If you can find PC formatted Zip disks, snag 'em; they can be easily reformatted to work on the Mac. (And vice-versa, if the need is there.) * Speaking of which, YES, you can take a PC formatted Zip disk and read it in your Mac's Zip drive PROVIDED you have the appropriate PC access software running. I've tried it with PC Exchange (included in System 7.5) and it works fine. Presumably you can also read Mac disks in a PC Zip drive, though you'd need a comparable "read Mac disks" utility on the PC. - - - - - THE TITLE BOUT: IOMEGA ZIP vs SYQUEST EZ135 SyQuest will soon be releasing a new drive called the "EZ135" (formerly known by its code name, "Roadrunner"). This drive will reportedly cost ~$230 for an external version (~$200 for an internal version) and use ~$20 cartridges that store 135-MB each. EZ135 weighs about 2-3 lbs (considerably more than the diet-conscious Zip), but is also about twice as fast. There are many mixed messages about which drive will ultimately prevail. However, I personally feel that the Zip drive will be the winner for several reasons. Here's why: * The Zip drive is cheaper. Zip costs $200 for external, while EZ135 is ~$30 more. Furthermore, when the Zip drive starts to sell internally, chances are it will cost considerably less than the EZ135's internal price of $200. * Zip cartridges are smaller, lighter, and more transportable. EZ135's cartridges will likely need to be stored in the same sort of padded carrying case as "standard" SyQuest cartridges. As a result, you'll see less of them being used with portable computers and, consequently, with desktop machines. * Zip already has a substantial market lead over SyQuest. Historically speaking, the Mac market hasn't had much in the way of brand-loyalty. SyQuest drives became the predominant standard not because of any outstanding features, but simply because they were cheap in comparison to the more expensive Bernoulli drives. However, I can count literally hundreds of people who have abandoned their SyQuest drives for the Zip drive. * The Zip will eventually be offered as optional equipment in Power Computing's Mac clones (and hopefully Apple's own products), whereas the EZ135 will not. This has the potential to give the Zip drive an even larger marketing lever. * Though EZ135 is faster, Zip is already fast enough for the majority of users. QuickTime movies, sound files, and similar time-intensive files play just fine from Zip. Only a comparatively few users will actually _need_ the additional speed that EZ135 offers, and when you consider this in relation to everything else, the EZ135's speed becomes a not-so-important factor. * EZ135 cartridges hold about 30-MB more data after formatting, true, but is that enough to justify a more expensive, heavier drive? I don't think so. Again, the fact that the Zip is so easily transportable makes it the better drive, regardless of the data storage capacity. If SyQuest's new drive were to hold, say, 200-MB or more it would be a considerably different story. * People may be angry at SyQuest for "holding out" on the community. More than a few users have wondered out loud why SyQuest didn't introduce the EZ135 before Zip came on the scene. The most logical answer is that SyQuest was making so much money off its other, lower-capacity drives that they didn't want to rock the boat by introducing the EZ135. Only when Iomega started severely cutting into SyQuest's market did SyQuest respond with athe EZ135. In short, it seems that SyQuest was more interested in lining its own pockets instead of advancing the technology. While this is probably good for business, it doesn't make the users any happier. It's ultimately a simple matter of time deciding which drive will prevail, but if I had to place money on the outcome, I'd bet on Zip. - - - - - THE RUMOR MILL... Remember, these are JUST RUMORS! * It has been brought to my attention that at a recent MacWorld Expo in San Francisco, Iomega was giving out "dummy" Zip cartridges, presumably as some sort of promotional gimmick. Apparently Iomega had some sort of deal going where you could trade on these dummy cartridges for real Zip cartridges. Truth or fiction, I have no idea. * A longstanding rumor about a 200-MB Zip drive has touched just about everyone's screens. To the best of my knowledge, this rumor started when, in an interview regarding the Zip drive, an Iomega executive made a statement to the effect that "Zip technology is at its infancy" and that "it would be easy enough to make a Zip drive that can store twice the current amount or more." Needless to say, many people took this to mean that a 200-MB Zip drive is in the works. As best as I've been able to ascertain, *a 200-MB Zip drive, if it ever comes to light, will not be available anytime soon*. Realistically speaking, this makes lots of financial sense for Iomega. 100-MB Zip drives are selling faster than Iomega can make them; if they make a 200-MB drive available now (or within the next month or three), that will instantly cut 100-MB Zip drive sales down to the bone as people wait for the 200-MB drives. Why cut their own throats? I don't doubt that larger capacity Zip drives will *eventually* come to light, but I also believe that it'll be at least half a year before we see them. (The "Viper" drive that is tentatively being developed may be the drive which this rumor sprouted from.) - - - - - Damn, this thing gets more massive each time around. <:-) steveg@phantom.com ==========