I can confirm that the media is starting to degrade - at least, it does if it wasn't stored properly. I have a couple of cartridges here that are shedding badly. You can manually open the cartridge by tripping the catches and sliding the door open, and look at it. Here's a picture of such a shedding/unusable cartridge after an attempt to read it: https://i.imgur.com/Pb4AyQo.jpg The oxide clogs the heads up pretty good - it's vital to keep the heads clean and to inspect cartridges before using them so you don't gunk them up. Look for dull/chalky looking media. Obviously any mold spots are bad as well. And if you do get a bunch of read errors (clunking noise), be sure to check and clean the heads before using a good cartridge. I'm not sure if the oxide buildup will damage otherwise good media, but I can't help but think it might.
I do have a fully working 10MB drive and controller, and the ability to image cartridges. I'd love to find more actual technical documentation on these drives as well, everything I know about them is from getting mine to run. I'm also always looking for more cartridges. -Ian On Sun, Oct 14, 2018 at 9:59 PM Michael Brutman via cctalk <cctalk@classiccmp.org> wrote: > > Hi Eric, > > I have working 10MB and 20MB units here being driven by a PC XT with the > Iomega specific card for them. > > I've had to puts lots of effort into cleaning the heads on them. I'm not > sure if there is an oxide shedding problem or just 30 years of dust that > I'm fighting, but they do seem to be very finicky at this stage. It also > could be a media formatting problem; I think they have servo tracks that > were laid down at manufacturing time, so if you have a read error on the > servo track there is no way to fix it. > > > Mike > > > On Fri, Oct 12, 2018 at 9:34 AM Eric Smith via cctalk <cctalk@classiccmp.org> > wrote: > > > Does anyone have the user, technical and/or service manual for the original > > 10MB Iomega Bernoulli drives? Bitsavers has the manuals for the later > > half-height 10.0/10.5 MB "Alpha-10H", but I'm looking for docs for the > > original model, which was full-height with a SASI (pre-SCSI) interface. > > > > I have the drives, about 20 cartridges that I want to image, and some > > additional scratch cartridges. > > > > I've never used Bernoulli drives before. These drives and cartridges were > > last used around 1986. I'll disconnect and test the power supply before > > powering up the actual drives, but is there anything else I should be > > concerned with? > > > > Does anyone have known-working 8-inch Bernoulli drives? > >
