• Please review our updated Terms and Rules here
  • From now on we will require that a prefix is set for any items in the sales area. We have created regions and locations for this. We also require that you select a delivery option before posting your listing. This will hopefully help us streamline the things that get listed for sales here and help local people better advertise their items, especially for local only sales. New sales rules are also coming, so stay tuned.

IOMEGA SCSI removable "thing"

barryp

Experienced Member
Joined
Jun 20, 2003
Messages
355
Location
Cary, North Carolina
It's not really identified but the sticker does say IOMEGA; Model BETA 20IA. It has an opening that's about as wide as a 5¼" floppy disk and as tall as three 3½" floppy disks.

I'm about to toss it unless one of y'all want to pay shipping cost to get your hands on it.
 
mbbrutman said:
Is it an old Bernoulli box?

That was my guess, the hole for the cartridge is smaller than I would have expected though......

It's too heavy to ship, probably not rare enough to be valuable. Its' days are numbered.
 
You should try to find a buyer, even if you have to sell it on ePay.

Bernoulli boxes are historically significant. This is the only form of reliable removeable mass storage that I know of from that era. They were fabulously expensive, and worth it too. And of course it is named for the Bernoulli principle, where the head floats above the media instead of scraping it like a floppy disk drive does.

This was also an Iomega product before they became a 'flash-in-the-pan' with the Zip drive.
 
mbbrutman said:
You should try to find a buyer.

Is that you? I don't want to mess with it, my experience with eBay is that stuff that I think should be considered valuable isn't and vice-versa. I have several items listed in an attempt to avoid filling the trash can.
 
I'm not offering to buy it so my opinion is worthless, but of all of the things I see people buy a Bernoulli box isn't a bad choice. I would think that it would sell on eBay because it was sold for multiple platforms and it was a well known peripheral. But yes, I've been wrong before.

Is this thing SCSI or SASI? Man, if it were SCSI it would be one hell of an addition to my PCjr. (The PCjr currently has a 544MB Fujitsu drive, but a Bernoulli box would be much more appropriate for the machine.)


Mike
 
mbbrutman said:
Is this thing SCSI or SASI?

There's a 50-pin angled header accessed at the back and labeled J4, right next to it is another header, J6, pointed down, which is labeled SCSI, there are jumpers labeled 0, 1, 2, P, D, and the last one I can't make out........


AND, all I ask is shipping cost to the first taker.
 
Barry,

I'm being sorely tempted here. Give me a day or two to see if this monster will work.

Sounds like this is the 20MB cartridge version. They had a 10MB version that had what looked like 8" disk platters, and later versions that were smaller.

If it truly is SCSI this would be very tempting. It'd be bigger than the Jr. :)



Mike
 
Lemme know if ya need any media. I think I have a few 20Mb, and I know I have a bunch of 10s, in the 8" media. The 10Mb media will work in the 20Mb drive. Sounds like the one he has is the 5" though.

--T
 
Btw, is this monster internal or external? Have any cartridges for it? Ever see it work? Do you have the Iomega PC2 interface card that came with it?

That's what sucks about this hobby .. so much interesting stuff, so little time.

I'm trying to get registered for classiccmp.org so that I can post a question about general specs on this drive. That is a *very* knowledgeable bunch, but they tend to be minicomputer bigots.
 
mbbrutman said:
Btw, is this monster internal or external?

'Tis internal, definitely 5¼", NOT 8".

mbbrutman said:
Have any cartridges for it?

Nary a one.

mbbrutman said:
Ever see it work?

Nope, I'd have more info if I had. I vaguely remember hooking it up on the SCSI chain to an Adaptec AHA-1542CF but my memory isn't what it once was.

mbbrutman said:
Do you have the Iomega PC2 interface card that came with it?

Yes, I have two of them. At least they're PC2B/50, but I'm positive I got them separately. 8-bit SCSI cards.

mbbrutman said:
That's what sucks about this hobby .. so much interesting stuff, so little time.

And I've never taken the time to investigate this gadget, maybe it's wonderful?!?!?!?

Anybody wanting it also gets the two SCSI cards at no charge other than shipping.
 
Ok, so how heavy is thing thing? Does it look like it's in reasonable condition?

I'm expecting a 5150 and 5161 (see other thread) shortly, and it's going to take some work to get that running. The Bernoulli box is real appealing to me, especially since it appears to be SCSI and not the proprietary interface. Besides the Iomega cards old Adaptec or Future Domain cards might be able to drive it too. I'm trying to locate reasonably priced media.

Any chance you could hook it up to a SCSI card just to see if it reports in? It's worth the risk to ship, but it would be nice to know if the thing even reports in.

I know .. getting to be more trouble than it's worth. :)

To me it is wonderful. A 20MB Bernoulli box was to lust after .. it cost more than most of the machines it was hooked up to. I was on 5.25" floppies (360 at that) until 1990 .. trying to imagine 20MB of removable storage was just beyond me.

Later in life Iomega started making Zip drives. Glorified floppies. And then the click of death problems came .. The last time I saw an Iomega product in a store it was a rebadged CD Writer. Lame.
 
Let's not forget the late, lamented Ditto drive (I've got one, 3.6Gb, never been used).

If you do a search on eBay, an auction came up a few days ago for two 90Mb Bernoulis, a single & a dual, external. They come with 25 media, for an opening bid of $25.00. Might be a bargain, if you're in the market.

--T
 
If I'm going to get a Bernoulli, it'll have to be Barryp's. He's trying to unload, and he's being patient.

eBay is nice, but I much prefer these private sales between collectors/enthusiasts.

I still can't get registered for the cctalk mailing list at classiccmp and I don't know why - I wanted to ask about the Beroulli Box (the 20 IA) over there to get opinions on whether they were problematic or not.
 
I've never had a 20Mb 5.25" Bernouli box, but I've used the 8" 10 & 20Mb ones a little, and I had a couple of the 44Mb 5.25" that I used a lot, till I upgraded to a 77Mb one, which I also only used for a little while. I never had any complaints with any of the ones I have used.

--T
 
mbbrutman said:
If I'm going to get a Bernoulli, it'll have to be Barryp's. He's trying to unload, and he's being patient.

I don't like the idea of trashing something, although I'd less reluctant if it didn't seem to be rare or valued. We're moving and it's neither reasonable to take it with nor to pay to store it.

I might be able to connect it/test it, but it'll be a few days. (Most especially if we sell the house soon.)

Incidentally I also have a Ditto drive right in front of me. Never fiddled with it, but.............



Barry Peterson

Again, I'm not looking to make a penny on some of my stuff, but I must find new homes for these things.


(Kind of like puppies or kittens isn't it?)
 
My g/f bought the Ditto a few years ago to back-up her laptop, but right after she got it, found a good deal on an external PCMCIA hard drive, so she uses that instead, and the Ditto never got used.

--T
 
Terry Yager said:
My g/f bought the Ditto a few years ago to back-up her laptop, but right after she got it, found a good deal on an external PCMCIA hard drive, so she uses that instead, and the Ditto never got used.

My Ditto is an internal tape drive......... but it also says Easy 800.
 
Barry - understood. Money isn't the issue here, on your side or my side. I just wouldn't want you to go through the hassle of shipping it if it turns out to be a dud. I'm willing to wait (if you can) to see if at least it shows up as a device on a SCSI card.

What is your deadline for cleaning it out? If I'm dragging too much give me a shout (mbbrutman at brutman.com). I'll admit I'm kind of preoccupied in a landscaping project at the moment. I did finally get registered for cctalk at classiccmp.org so I can ask a different group about the mechanical aspects of this thing.


Mike
 
Back
Top