From owner-freebsd-hackers  Tue Sep  5 10:29:26 1995
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Date: Tue, 5 Sep 1995 13:30:20 -0400
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To: freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.org (FreeBSD hackers)
From: dennis@et.htp.com (dennis)
Subject: Re: QIC-80 tape driver sucks..
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>As Jake Hamby wrote:
>
>> > Upgrade to SCSI. Floppy tape is fundamentally broken and unfixable.
>
>> If I had $600-$700 to spend I would probably have bought a DAT or 8mm SCSI
>> drive, but I thought it would be much more economical (since this computer
>> is for home use and my backup needs aren't that great) to stick with a
>> floppy tape backup since it only cost $170.
>
>Did you ever consider buying a used QIC-150 drive?  They are
>rock-solid, only somewhat more expensive than this cr*ppy QIC-40/80
>stuff, and might suffice for most ``home computer'' sites.
>

Low cost tape is important for another reason, that is it gives you the
ability to move large volumes from one site to another (home to work at
minimum) when dial downloading is unacceptable. For this, you need to buy
more than 1 tape drive which multiplies the effect of low cost drives.

Dennis