Date: Thu, 16 Nov 2000 18:52:27 -0600 From: David Kelly <dkelly@hiwaay.net> To: Grandpa Walrus <root@web-walrus.com> Cc: questions@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Regarding CD-R drives Message-ID: <200011170052.eAH0qRS76915@grumpy.dyndns.org> In-Reply-To: Message from Grandpa Walrus <root@web-walrus.com> of "Thu, 16 Nov 2000 16:53:02 CST." <Pine.BSF.3.96.1001116165013.52885C-100000@iceberg.web-walrus.com>
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Grandpa Walrus writes: > I'm going to be investing in a CD-R for backup purposes on my server. I > currently run a Western Digital IDE hard drive, and I was considering > getting an IDE CD-R to run on the second controller. Is this > preferable/advisable, or should I spend the extra on a SCSI card and > CD-R drive? You didn't buy SCSI for the HD. Seems out of place that you would consider it for the backup system. IMHO CD-R's are great fun to have. Perfect for the latest -RELEASE or custom FreeBSD. But 600MB to 700MB of storage is limited. And the most reliable way I know to write a CD-R (under any OS) is to make an image file on the HD first, then copy that off the the CD-R (using burncd or cdrecord). If you are open to SCSI then there have been a number of source selling Symbios 875-based Ultra Wide SCSI cards for the $60 price range. Others have had new DDS-2 tape drives for under $100. A DDS-2 tape will hold an honest 4G for $6 to $10. And far easier to do backups with than a CD-R. Support of IDE tape drives has been spotty in FreeBSD. Someone else will have to comment on that. > Any brands that are more compatible/better than others? Two or three years ago I launched into just that very question at work. In the early days Yamaha CDR-100's were outrageous for being the first to 4X write. Even more outrageous because they really did work. Other drives were not so good even at 2X. Had noticed at the time gang CD burning stations which had previously used Yamaha CDR-100's did not use the new Yamahas. Spent a lot of time on the phone asking, "I like my old Yamahas, why can't I get new Yamahas?" No good answers until I got to an engineer at one of the standalone gang CD writer companies who said, "The old Yamaha behaved very well on the SCSI bus but newer CD-R's from most everybody will hog the bus longer than they should resulting in coasters. Matsushita (Panasonic) 7502's behave as well as the old Yamahas." Keep in mind we are talking about 2 to 6 CD-R's and one HD on one bus making up to 6 copies at a time. So I turned in my report to the boss. Then ran out and bought a 7502 for myself. Still happy with it altho I've been using it less than I ever thought I would. Just not enough time to play with all my toys. Recently noticed http://www.computer123.com/ has (had) the SCSI version of that drive for $106. Looks like they are out. But they have an CD-RW IDE version with Windows/Mac software for $126 or $136 (depends mostly on packaging). The Latest CD-R Thing these days is RAW writing. The ability to duplicate errors from the original in the copy. For duplicating copy protected CD's. Don't know if the 7502 will, or is capable of with firmware update. -- David Kelly N4HHE, dkelly@hiwaay.net ===================================================================== The human mind ordinarily operates at only ten percent of its capacity -- the rest is overhead for the operating system. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
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