Can I Put Old Drives in One Cabinet?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Alan Bell
  • Start date Start date
A

Alan Bell

I do graphic design and find myself with old jobs stored on obsolete media.
Occasionally I need to copy from one of these old jobs in my current work.
At first I begin copying my entire library of old media jobs onto new media
as a matter of standard procedure. But that didn't last long. Then (and this
were I am currently at) I have an old computer that has a 5.25" floppy and
another machine that has a Jaz drive. I never use these machines unless I
need to access old media. The days of the 3.5 floppy and the Zip drive are
now numbered. If I follow this procedure, I'll have another machine just
sitting around for Zip media. I know, for instance, that there are
standalone zip drives. Is it possible to get some sort of housing that will
hold a half dozen drives then mount all these old drives in one enclosure --
just the drives not another computer -- and somehow connect them to my new
latest, greatest computer. Then when I upgrade my current computer, the
ancient drive array wouldn't have to change save for maybe adding a DVD
drive to it when it's inevitably replaced by something else.
 
If the drives are all SCSI you can use a SCSI enclosure.
SCSI floppy drives are available but are rare, SCSI Jaz and Zip should be easier to find.
 
I do graphic design and find myself with old jobs stored on obsolete media.
Occasionally I need to copy from one of these old jobs in my current work.
At first I begin copying my entire library of old media jobs onto new media
as a matter of standard procedure. But that didn't last long. Then (and this
were I am currently at) I have an old computer that has a 5.25" floppy and
another machine that has a Jaz drive. I never use these machines unless I
need to access old media. The days of the 3.5 floppy and the Zip drive are
now numbered. If I follow this procedure, I'll have another machine just
sitting around for Zip media. I know, for instance, that there are
standalone zip drives. Is it possible to get some sort of housing that will
hold a half dozen drives then mount all these old drives in one enclosure --
just the drives not another computer -- and somehow connect them to my new
latest, greatest computer. Then when I upgrade my current computer, the
ancient drive array wouldn't have to change save for maybe adding a DVD
drive to it when it's inevitably replaced by something else.
Click to expand...

If the drives use varying interfaces, but not SCSI, you essentially
need a computer in the housing anyway, so the goal might be a
"housing" that's just a computer case with maximum potential for
stuffing drives into it.

On the other hand, I would instead recommend just copying off all this
data now, to a hard drive, then archiving it appropriately on CDR or
DVD.


Dave
 
On the other hand, I would instead recommend just copying off all this
data now, to a hard drive, then archiving it appropriately on CDR or
DVD.
Click to expand...

IMHO have to be excelent quality ones & properly archived; I read
somewhere on the net recently testing CDRs that after 2y mostly were
not readable anymore (but should be at least for 10y like
manufacturers say...) ... :-(

-- Regards, SPAJKY
& visit - http://www.spajky.iscyber.com
Celly-III OC-ed,"Tualatin on BX-Slot1-MoBo!"
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Quality is very spotty. I have some Imation 16x CDs that the backing peeled off after a few months, making them useless. The old Imation 4x CDs still can be read in any drive.
 
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