On Aug 7, 2026, at 5:32 PM, Fred Cisin via cctalk <[email protected]> wrote: > >>> Alternatively, has anyone ever tried to use a parallel ZIP-100 on a PDP-11? > > On Fri, 7 Aug 2026, Ethan Dicks via cctalk wrote: >> I am not aware of anyone using parallel ZIP drives on anything but a >> PC parallel port. The SCSI ones work fine on pretty much any machine > > Maybe my experiences were atypical, or maybe that's a use of the word "fine" > that I was unaware of :-) > When they first came out, they were really cool. > But, they started dying. A lot. > > Was the "click of death" there all along, or was there a design or > manufacturing flaw introduced later on? > I heard that some had a rubber bumper on the head assembly, and some not? > Could THAT have been the problem?
I bought one of the early SCSI drives for my Mac PowerBook 520c while I was still in the Navy, onboard the USS George Washington (CVN-73), and it was “amazing”. I got the laptop a little over a year before I got out of the Navy, just after the one year mark the laptop’s backlight died, and after I got out and bought a PowerMac 8500/180, I found that the disks were largely unreadable (apparently click of death). My PowerMac G4/450 came with a built in Zip drive, I never used it. I personally wouldn’t touch a Zip disk with the preverbal 10-foot pole at this point. I’m at the point where I don’t see me getting one of my physical PDP-11’s up and running for probably another 10+ years, basically I view that as a probable retirement project. I also consider the Capacitors in the power supplies to be a mandatory replacement prior to applying power. I have SCSI adaptors, and despite my collection of SCSI HD’s, I’ll probably opt for a SCSI drive emulator. I installed a couple in VAXstation 4000’s during my last Sabbatical, and they’re awesome! Sadly I rarely have any time for Classic Computing at the moment, and when I do it’s usually Mainframe or VMS related, and done via emulation. I don’t have the time to keep the physical hardware running. At least I was able to spend my last sabbatical doing preventative maintenance on my Amiga’s, VAXstation 4000’s and to check over my Atari TT030. Zane
