[SunRescue] Tape drive

[Greg A. Woods]

[ On Sunday, May 20, 2001 at 03:38:29 (-0400), Michael S. Schiller wrote: ]
> Subject: Re: [SunRescue] Tape drive
>
> While on the subject of Tape drives, I have a couple of 8500 8mm tape drives
> in my SC2000 (one came with it, the other moved from my SS690), and both of
> them are complaining about needing 'periodic cleaning'. Where can I get the
> proper cleaning tape for these?

There are a zillion places to buy Exabyte cleaning tapes online.  The
new "premium cleaning cartrige" (I think it's part#309258) will work in
all exabyte drives (well at least up to the Eliant 820).

> Am I correct in the assumption that a regular
> video tape cleaner wouldn't be the correct thing to use?

No, don't use an 8mm video cleaner -- it's far too abrasive.

Don't use video 8mm media either -- it's usually too dirty and can be
too abraisive as a result.  It used to "work" for a little while on 8200
models but eventually killed the drives.  Some folks swear by it, but
they're lucky because they've usually managed to find batches of video
tape that ere actually formulated as data but ended up being sold for
video use.

Most of the third-party media makers have data-grade tape that's
compatible with Exabyte, but personally I've only ever bought brand name
Exatape media, at least for my new Eliant 820 drive.

>  Does the cleaning
> tape somehow tell the drive it's been cleaned?

Yes, the media recognition code on the cleaner identifies it as such.
The drive runs a cleaning cycle automatically then ejects the tape.

-- 
							Greg A. Woods

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