Subject: Re: Cassette Media

From: chris <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed May 14 21:35:00 2003

>I have a number of data cassette tapes still in original packaging. A maxell 
>CS-600XD says 600feet length, 16,000ftpi and D/CAS-86 compatible. Have no 
>idea what that means. 

Well, at least it gives me the specs to find a compatible tape. In doing 
some more searching, I'm having a very hard time finding anyone that 
actually still sells the tape. A few people still list them, but so far 
no one seems to actually have them. Probably because from what I can 
find, Maxell no longer makes the tape.

Any chance you might want to part with one tape on the cheap? 

Although, honestly, if I can't find a supplier for tapes, it won't really 
matter if the drive works or not. Maybe I'll just stick an audio tape in 
it and see what happens (found a newsgroup posting that says not to even 
think of doing that... but they don't say why... if the universe implodes 
tomorrow, you can all blame me for using a cheap audio tape in the drive)

-chris
<http://www.mythtech.net>

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From: Geoff Reed <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed May 14 23:34:00 2003

theres no header on the data tapes (IIRC)

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From: [email-masked] (Tony Duell)
Date: Thu May 15 15:39:00 2003

> theres no header on the data tapes (IIRC)

Maybe some of them are leaderless, but others certainly have leaders. In 
fact some drives use an optical sensor to detect the transparent leader 
for BOT/EOT detection.

-tony

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From: Geoff Reed <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu May 15 17:28:00 2003

>fact some drives use an optical sensor to detect the transparent leader

No problem Tony, the only one of these tapes I've ever had my hands on was 
leaderless.