Death of (a few) tape drives…
Lately, it seems that I have no luck with my tape drives. First my good old trustworthy (and no longer in production because the company went bankrupt) Onstream ADR-60 tape died.
Yesterday the Sony SDT-9000 DDS-3 Tape in my ADIC changer choked itself on a cartridge (it is solidly wedged in. Even disassembling the drive and following the Sony emergency ejection procedure meant no luck). The mechanics are stuck and it will not let go of the tape.
And now another tape drive (an HP 35480 which I pulled from the “stuff not used in a while” box) just ate another of the DDS cartridges (it snapped the tape cleanly through. Seems that the end-of-tape detection is hosed and the drive motor just went on full speed and pulled the tape from the reel).
Thanks to eBay, I’m now waiting for a Sony replacement drive. I wonder if I’m able to re-assemble the tape changer…
adr dat hardware tape drives
Leave a Reply