How fast is a zip drive?

[Agent004]

I am about to get a 250 MB zip drive in a day's time and I was wondering how fast are those zip drives, especially those ATAPI version or other internal version.

Info on the usb version will be very helpful.

Thanks in advance

 

[PG]

They are slower than snot, but sometimes a necessary evil to transport files from work to home, etc.
If you don't have a CD burner yet I would get one first.

 

[sohcrates]

i bought my dad a usb zip 250. it seems to be faster than a floppy drive, so i'll give it that. but otherwise, it's certainly not a light speed media

 

[Noriaki]

Transfer rate is around 800KB/s to 1MB/s regardless of USB or ATAPI.

Not terribly fast though bunches faster than a floppy disk, it's around the same speed as 6X CDR.

 

[Agent004]

Thank You Noriaki. That's the answer I was just looking for.

Thanks people

 

[NelsonMuntz]

My Atapi is much faster than my Parallel port, but the ATAPI still is not super fast. I use it just to transfer files from work to home and sometimes the files are really big, so it takes a little while, but it isn't too bad.

 

[cheric4]

I used to transfer files around with my zip drives (5 of them, total)...Lately, I've been using those smart media/compact flash reader and writer to transfer files. They are usb so you don't have to reboot the system everytime. They are reasonably fast for file traferring. And about the same price of a zip 250 drive if not less.

 

[Jiggz]

I know you already got the answer you're looking for. But if you have to buy one get the USB version. It's headache free.

 

[chansen]

For transferring files, Zip is fine. Just don't archive data with them - that's a job for CDR or tape. Zip disks and drives have a chequered past with repect to reliability. I have about 10 zip disksthat are 2 to 4 years old, and two no longer function. Much higher failure rate than floppies. One of the reputed causes is the "Click of Death", detailed at www.grc.com.

Craig

 

[Salvador]

Back when I didn't know crap about paralell and SCSI, I picked up a SCSI zip drive for my laptop and loved it. It was so fast and whenever my friend complained about his slow zip, I couldn't understand why. Now I know that my SCSI zip was about twice as fast as even the newer USB zips, so that gives you an idea. I still have my SCSI zip and use it to this day. I never bought more than 5 discs for it though. No thanks at $10 a pop and the price still hasn't changed 5 years later. It's still a great little way of backing up your stuff quick though.

OTOH, with the prices of cd burners today, I still don't know why people are buying zips. It's so much cheaper to just burn a disc.

Sal