Mel,
To add to the backup discussion, I have all my important software that I use on a fairly regular basis installed on the C partition of my 6.4 Gb hard drive. The C partition is 2 Gb but the important stuff occupies just under 1 Gb.
I have both a zip and a jaz drive. At regular intervals, I backup my entire C partition to a jaz disk using Drive Image by the Powerquest Corp. It's a good thing I do this because after my hard drive "grenaded" on me last April, I simply installed a new hard drive and was back up and running in 25 minutes by restoring the image file from my jaz disk. All my personal preferences...everything was back just the way it was. Reinstalling all my software is something I'm not about to do again (took over three days the last time). This scheme certainly works for me and, as yet, I have not found a more convenient solution. Click one button in Drive Image to save the image file (takes about 50 minutes) and click another button to restore the C partition (takes 25 minutes). No other "tricks" to know or to remember.
As of now I have 9 jaz disks (including the tools disk) since I bought my jaz drive in October of 1996. I just purchased my last 3 jaz disks several days ago at Sam's Club for $219.99 (plus tax) with no rebate required. That's $20.00 lower than when I last purchased 3 jaz disks there. I can also tell you that I've never had any problem whatsoever with my jaz drive or any of the disks and I use it every single day.
As of now I have 12 zip disks (including the tools disk) since I bought my parallel port zip drive in April of 1996. I don't anticipate buying any more zip disks for quite a while. By the way, while there I notice that Iomega branded zip disk 10 packs are priced at $99.99 (plus tax) at Sam's Club with, again, no rebate required. Again, I have never had a problem whatsoever with my zip drive or any of the disks, and I also use it every single day.
For what it's worth I recently set my parallel port to run in what is called ECP + EPP mode (enables the bi-directional function) and my parallel port zip drive now runs, from what I can tell, about 300% faster than it originally did. I'm not kidding! At first I thought something was wrong and it didn't work when I backed up my Quicken file(s) which is over 4 Mb. I was used to how long it usually took to do this and was astounded at the speed improvement. I had to look at the files on the zip disk to make sure that they were all there.
I don't consider myself an average user by any means. I am at my computer probably 8 hours on an average day, so I feel that my personal tie ratio is probably higher than the overall mean average of all the users out there with 15 million zip drives and ? jaz drives.
I have one friend who owns an IBM APtiva with a built-in internal zip drive and he has never bought even one zip disk. I have another friend who has a parallel port zip drive and, so far, has bought two ten packs since buying the zip drive.
In addition, from what I read, businesses are starting to use disks like they are "candy". I retired from McDOnnell Douglas late 1996 and friends that I still talk to there tell my that zip drives are spreading (company purchased) like the ebola virus. I'm told that even jaz drives are starting to appear on people's desks. Even when I was still there I knew people that would bring their personal zip drives into work so they could copy work to a zip disk and could take it home with them.
I will probably upgrade to the 2 Gb jaz drive within the next 8 months and because I like to have quality and reliability I could care less if it costs more than a competitor's product. I know what I have now, so why should I take a chance on being "hosed" by some other product?
I may be biased because of previous profits from Iomega stock and the large, for me, position I'm still holding, but I doubt it. I've tried to write this from a user's perspective and I know I would feel the same way if I had never owned any Iomega stock.
Dave |
