[SunRescue] Playing with my tape drive, got some questions... (also, anyone n eed TR-4 tapes?)

[Ken Hansen]

I finally pulled down my 8mm Sun/Exabyte (Exabyte 8200 in Sun lunch-box
case) drive
and am starting to play with it, and I have a few questions:

	- Tape cleaners - how often, suggested method - cleaning tape?

	- Media - this is an EX-8200 drive, so anything longer than 112
meters
	  is pointless? My understanding is that this drive is good for 2
Gig
	  (no compression available).

	- Where to get media - what brands are considered "good"? Cost
appears
	  to hover around $4.25 - $5.00/112m DAT tape, is that about right?

	- How to reset an Exabyte drive? I have three drives, the one
mentioned
	  above appears fine, then I have a coupe more "bare" Exabytes that
I
	  think need to be reset (one just spits the tape out as soon as I
put it in)
	  or at least cleaned severly. (I haven't powered up the third one)
Any
	  pointers to FAQ or other info-bases on these older 8mm drives?

Also, I found Ihave 11 or 12 TR-4 tapes new in the box (un-opened) - I think
these
are quite expensive, and take 4/8 Gig (IIRC). I got these in anticipation of
a new
drive for anold PC, but the drive never came - anyone buy one of those cheap
TR-4 SCSI drives and need tapes? Drop me a note off-list if interested... If
these
tapes are still as expensive as I remember, I would be happy to trade 1 TR-4
for two 8mm 112 meter tapes...

Thanks in advance,

Ken

Ken Hansen ICTI
Ken.Hansen at icti-usa.com