MO drives..

[Michael S. Hartman]

Does any one have experiance with MO drives? If you do, could you
answer a few questions? I'm thinking about buying a MO drive instead
of a new hard drive since I can easily and cheaply add more room,
compared to a new HD. I've got a 212 MB HD now, so I figure that I can
put all common used programs on the HD and put the games and other
odds anbd ends on the MO drive.

What are the average access times for the MO drives? I've seen 2 kinds,
a 3.5 128MB MO and a 5.25 1.2GB MO drive. The ad says that they have
an "effective" access time of 19ms. What does that mean?

Does a MO drive look just like another drive, or is there special
software needed to store info on it? Are there any DOS drivers needed
for the computer to see the drive? What type of interface is needed to
hook it up to the computer? IDE, floppy, or it's own?

Has anybody seen any really good deals on MO drives? The only
company I've seen selling them is Pinnical Micro ( not sure of name ).

---
***********************************************************
* Michael Hartman * Sure there are alot of other *
* har...@eng.auburn.edu * fish in the ocean, but who *
* 02CPE * wants to date a fish? *
* Auburn University * *
***********************************************************

[Richard Seabright]

Michael S. Hartman (har...@eng.auburn.edu) wrote:

: What are the average access times for the MO drives? I've seen 2 kinds,

: a 3.5 128MB MO and a 5.25 1.2GB MO drive. The ad says that they have
: an "effective" access time of 19ms. What does that mean?

I was at Comdex last week and saw a Fujitsu (s.p?) mo drive that
used 236 meg 3.5 " disks, and was also compatable with the older 128 Mb disks.
The drive uses a fast scsi II interface with a 30 ms access time and a 5 Mb/s
transferr rate. I'm not sure what "effective access time" means but it
could be calculated with disk caching enabled.

: Does a MO drive look just like another drive, or is there special

: software needed to store info on it? Are there any DOS drivers needed
: for the computer to see the drive? What type of interface is needed to
: hook it up to the computer? IDE, floppy, or it's own?

The one I saw came in external and internal versions with an
inculded Adaptec bus mastering local bus controller (can't remember the
model #). This particular card has a build in bios, but some other Scsi
controllers need TSR's to be loded in dos.

: Has anybody seen any really good deals on MO drives? The only

: company I've seen selling them is Pinnical Micro ( not sure of name ).

I talked to the people at the booth for a while because I thought
the things were really cool, when I found out the price I nearly choked.
Retail the things go for Cdn$1400 and the disks are $59 each.

Could be fun to play with but you could buy a lot of good Hd's for
$1400.

HTH:
Rich Seabright.

[Felip Assael (uqal056@frmop22.cnusc.fr)]

In article <Ct58u...@mail.auburn.edu>,
har...@eng.auburn.edu (Michael S. Hartman) writes:
(...)

>What are the average access times for the MO drives? I've seen 2 kinds,
>a 3.5 128MB MO and a 5.25 1.2GB MO drive. The ad says that they have
>an "effective" access time of 19ms. What does that mean?
>

I have a 128M MO now. It works well, it is the IBM model, with
nominal 40ms access time. The Fujitsu model has 25 ms. The MO drives
have access time of 25 to 45 ms in the 128 MB format.
Some have internal cache and a good access time is due to cache.
I think it is technically impossible to have less than 20 ms on a 128MO.
1.2GB MO have a greater access time (40-55 ms) but with huge cache
they can have an effective access time of 17 ms or less.
The 230 MB MO have a total compatibility with 128 MO models. They are
all 3"1/2 models.
The 600/650 MB and 1.2GB/1.3GB are 5"1/4 models. They have two faces
while 3"1/2 have only one face.

>Does a MO drive look just like another drive, or is there special
>software needed to store info on it? Are there any DOS drivers needed
>for the computer to see the drive? What type of interface is needed to
>hook it up to the computer? IDE, floppy, or it's own?
>
>Has anybody seen any really good deals on MO drives? The only
>company I've seen selling them is Pinnical Micro ( not sure of name ).

MO drives are SCSI. If you have SCSI interface for your HD, don't bother
it is the same and MO drives are like a hard disk (a removable one).
You can consider yous MO drive as a second hard disk. You need drivers
if you have more than two hard disks or MO.
Some companies selling MO drives are Panasonic, IBM, HP, Sharp, Pinnacle
MaxOptics, Fujitsu ... Prices of 128MO are very low.

Hope this help.
Felip