From: hutch@bellman.lanl.gov (John Hutchinson)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: SyQuest vs. floptical
Date: 20 Nov 92 16:37:54 GMT
Reply-To: hutch@bellman.lanl.gov
Organization: Los Alamos National Laboratory

In article 88@uoft02.utoledo.edu, jsteiner@anwsun.phya.utoledo.edu (jason 'Think!' steiner) writes:
>how do SyQuest 44/88meg removable drives compare to flopticals?
>i'm especially interested in price. i'm leaning toward the SyQuest
>systems at the moment (bigger, faster), but i'd like to find out
>what the price margin between the 2 is.
>
>how much do the basic drives and disks cost?

Both the Syquest 44/88Mb units and the Floptical drives are SCSI, removable
media drives.  The Syquest units actually _are_ hard drives, just with removable
platters.  As such, they are fairly fast, roughly 25ms average access time
(another worthless speed rating) or on a par with most low-end hard disks.
Since they are SCSI units, you must have a host adapter to convert your Atari's
DMA signals to SCSI (unless you have a TT in which case it just plugs in).
ICD's famous Advantage Plus host adapters work well but the newest rage is
their LINK adapter which is a small self contained host adapter which simply
plugs onto your drive's SCSI port and you run your DMA cable from your ST to
the LINK and use ICD's software to manage the whole thing. Very nice.  Syquest
44 drives read/write/format 44Mb cartridges.  Syquest 88 drives can read 44Mb
carts but can only write/format to the 88's.  There was some scattered
consternation about the durability of Syquest carts some time ago, but from
personal experience, I've found them to be _very_ durable and reliable.

The floptical drive is relatively new on the scene and has the capability to
read/write/format standard 720K floppies, 1.4Mb "super" floppies and the new
21Mb optical floppies.  And although some 2-3x faster than a standard floppy
drive, they are considerably slower than a real hard drive.  Their beauty lies
in their very compact size and portability, especially when used with ICD's
LINK adapter.  It's also nice to put a 21Mb floptical disk in your shirt pocket.
Oh yes, in order to format 720K/1.44Mb floppies, you need the latest version
of ICD's software which comes with the LINK.

You can shop around, but _typical_ street prices are something like:

Syquest 44 external with case, power supply, cable, ICD host & 1 cart... $ 650
   "    88     "      "    "     "     "       "     "    "       "  ... $ 750

Syquest mechanisms alone can be purchased for about $200 less than the above.
Additional Syquest 44Mb carts run about $65-75 each; 88Mb carts $110-120.

Floptical external drive with case, power supply, cable, LINK & 1 cart...$ 480
Additional floptical 21Mb carts run about $25-35 each.

ICD LINK adapter alone... $90-$100
ICD Advantage/Advantage Plus host adapters... $90/$100

While widely available, a highly recommended source is TOAD computers in
Baltimore, MD, 1-800-448-TOAD.  Also, Purple Mountain Computers in Bellvue,
WA, 206-747-1519, recently had a very attractive price on floptical drives
w/LINK at $399 but I'm not sure if that price is still current.

Hope this answers most questions about Syquests & Floptical drives.
---

___________________________ John "HUTCH" Hutchinson _________________________
_________________ Fair Dinkum Technologies     Member - IAAD  _______________
________________ "No worries, mate... it's from Fair Dinkum!" _______________
____________ email: hutch@bellman.lanl.gov   GEnie: FAIR-DINKUM _____________
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st