Slashdot Mirror
30GB and 50GB Removables
After yesterdays bit on the 10 gig removables,
Chad Pommiss
wrote in to tell us about "A Philip Electronics offshoot named
OnStream that has
developed 30GB and 50GB removable drives, based on
"Advanced Digital Recording", boasting variable data rates
of 1 or 2MB/second (3GB/hour). Parallel, SCSI and IDE/ATAPI
versions are available from $299" Ok now that is
what I wanna keep my MP3s on.
Looks more like 15 gigs. With the best lossless compressor (http://heroine.tampa.fl.us/split) maybe 20 gigs for $400. Swapping CD-RW's might be faster than tape, too.
It's actually 15 and 25G. They quote compressed figures and assume 2:1 ratio. Go gzip your mp3s and tell me the result :)
;)
On the other hand:
"OnStream is working to qualify developers who are familiar with Linux to write drivers and tools to attach OnStream digital drives to systems running a Linux operating system. Initially, support for this solution will be from the community of Linux developers."
So they aren't totally pointy haired
-------
Warning: Slashdot may contain traces of nuts.
"These drives are compatible with Microsoft® Windows 95?, 98? and NT?"
I like how their use of Microsoft proprietary characters caused the meaning of the text to be improved.
Several things (most of which have already been said, but I thought I'd put them together):
/linear/ access, and probably awful seek times.
1) This is a tape drive. That means
2) The sizes they list are compressed sizes; however, mp3s are already compressed. You probably wouldn't be able to squeeze much more than 15G on one of these tapes.
3) The read speeds they list are native, which means compressed data will probably not be available this fast.
Overall, this drive seems to be being hyped for something that it is not. Maybe it's a nice cheap fast 'solution' for backing up large servers and stuff, but for PC usage, it is much less practical.
A closed mouth gathers no foot.
Sony AIT (8mm) drives start at 25GB native, and the next generation will be 50GB native - and they do 5MB/sec - more than twice as fast. The only thing special about this thing is the price... Sony drives start around $2000 and $50 for the tapes. DLT has similar capacities and speed (there is a 35GB version too), and costs even more.
I agree that Linux hardware support is a beautiful thing. However, let us keep in mind that CmdrTaco is only trying to keep ./'ers aware of (arguably) cool, (again, arguably) new technology. Asking about Linux support is fine; however, saying, for example, that DVD writers suck simply because the specs aren't available yet is stupid. We are hopefully all aware that vendor support for alternative operating systems would be great; however, don't knock hardware for software problems. Winmodems suck because the hardware is crippled; DVD-RAMs rule because they write DVDs.
Be nice to the hardware! The Matrox G200 is a good card. The kernel fb driver supports it. The G400 is cooler. Does the kernel support it? Does the answer make the card more or less cool?
I'm saying, knock the companies for not providing drivers. Not the hardware.
Any inaccuracies, inconsistencies, spelling or grammatical errors are purely the fault of your perception.
Go see Matrix.
Somebody get that guy an ambulance!
What I do know is that this site is (IMHO) improving rapidly. The new moderation system seems to promote layers of quality, and the better comments/commentors seem to rise to the top.
My bottom line has been (suggestion for all to think about here) support /., keep coming back, do your best work in posting comments and submitting stories, and be patient with the guys at the back end.
They ARE listening, and quality does seem to be rewarded here.
...Open Source isn't the only answer -- but it's almost always a better value than the alternatives...
What a waste of alignment points... Oh well.
This, as been aptly pointed out by many in the forum, is a tape drive, with uncompressed storage close to 15GB or 25GB on a variable speed media. Evidently it also has data write speeds up to 2mb/s, and currently supports only Windows solutions with Linux support soon, and other OSes such as Mac at a later date...
Why are they targetting the Windows market? Are there that many Windows systems that need tape backup that it makes more sense to do Windows first and Linux/Unix second? I thought servers with high data requirements were still predominantly Unix boxes, though perhaps they aren't targetting servers. Who is their target market then?
Maybe some clued in Windows sysadmin will be able to tell me differently, or someone will know of a use that begs for this solution in the large Windows desktop market, or perhaps the workstation market?
AS
-AS
*Pikachu*