>>From a techical point of view, I just think that Jazz and Zip are not good. I mean, I don't understand why the big fuss is all about. Why do people buy drives that are slower, holds less disk space, and cost more money than a Hard Drive? Tell me that? I don't understand people's logic. If people want portablity, why don't they buy a cd-r? I mean, it's a lot better in my opinion.
The Jazz 1 gig, cartige cost 100 bucks. The CD-R blank cost 5 bucks for 650 megs, so all together 10 bucks for 1.2 gig? If speed was what people were looking for, A Hard drive is much faster and much cheaper than a Jazz Drive. If it was me, I want a combination of hard drive and a CD-R. I simply do not understand why people get Jazz Drives.<<
Relentless -
I probably shouldn't bother, but I'm going to give you a straight answer. Basically, what it amounts to is that hard drives, CD-R, Zip and Jaz each serve a different purpose.
The cheapest CD-R I can find available now is 400 bucks for an internal model, 500 for the external. Jaz drives are 100 bucks less. True, the CD-R blanks are cheap, but they are not re-writable. Also, the process of mastering CD-ROMs in these devices is very slow, and is not simple to most people. But if what I want is to make permanent copies of fairly large amounts of data, then CD-R is the way to go.
My fiancee uses Zip to send her cartoons and illustrations, as graphics files, to print shops and magazines. The files are typically several megabytes in size, and she usually puts two or three on a disk. After the job is printed, she gets the Zip back and uses it for the next job. Once in a while some magazine she doesn't work for regularly doesn't return the Zip disk, but it's not a great loss at less than 15 bucks. For her, CD-R would not be the right choice, because it's too slow, and because these jobs don't need to be preserved permanently. Zip is perfect for this kind of thing. This is not the only thing it's good for, it's just one example.
At work, I keep a Jaz disk loaded with all kinds of drivers, Windows 95 and NT service packs, and applications which I'm always finding I need when I go to client's houses for remote access installations. We used to use CD-R for this purpose, but since the drivers, service packs and even the applications are continually being updated that wasn't really convenient or practical. Plus, I can use the Jaz drive on every single machine I come across. Some of the machines don't have CD-ROM drives.
At home, I have a Jaz drive which I use for backups. That's expensive but fast. I also use it as additional near-line storage. I got tired of adding and replacing hard drives. Now when I need another gig, I buy another cartridge.
I don't know where you get the idea that a hard drive is "much faster and much cheaper than a Jazz Drive." The Jaz drive is as fast as most hard drives, though not as fast as all. It is also not much more expensive. In the long run, since the cartriges can be had for less than a hundred bucks, my Jaz drive is costing me less than new hard drives would.
I have been thinking about getting a CD-R drive for my home, but I have not really needed it so far. It wouldn't do for me what my Zip and Jaz drives do.
- Allen |
