Installing Iomega Zip 250

[pgrosso 0]

Hi, i have a problem installing my paralell port Iomega Zip 250 in Windows NT 4 with SP6. When i try to install any driver (from Iomega Site or any other site), the installation freeze in "Up[censored] the Registry" step.

I kill process from Task Manager, but the problem now is when a try to access to the "Scsi Adapters" in Control Panel. When i focus in "Driver" tab, i receive the next message: "Error occurred getting driver list from inf file. Error=0".

 

I'd try the Microsoft Technet Solution published in Micrsoft's Web Page, but i haven't good results.

 

Can somebody help me.

[Christianb 8]

First off Iomega sucks and I would never recommending buying or using any of their products for anything, but a paperweight. That being said I would uninstall whatever driver you tried to use and then install the most recent drivers available at Iomega's website. Furthermore why are you still using NT 4 get Windows 2000 already. It's faster, it's more stable and if you have a Pentium 2 or better with 256 megs of ram or more I think you'll agree.

-Christian

[BladeRunner 0]

Hummm, funny, I thought the guy came here to ask for some help.

Not to be told that he needs to upgrade his OS at £90 and then throw away his £100 backup solution and source another one :-/

 

I guess I should ask.

As a user of Iomega ZIP drives since the days of the 100mb parallel port version, through Internal SCSI & Internal IDE I love the devices.

I only got rid of mine when my old unit eventually gave up the ghost and when I rebuilt my machine there wasn't really space for it.

They all gave me years of reliable service.

So, why are Iomega devices crap?

 

A possible fix from Iomega was to boot the WinNT machine to "last known good config" and then remove the software.

Now reboot, and grab the latest version from the Iomega site.

Now install the latest version WITHOUT the ZIP drive attached to the machine.

Add the device after the machine has fully finished installing the software and see if that works.

[pgrosso 0]

Thank´s to everyone.

 

The problem has been that the installation driver take a very long time to finish, but i cancel this process after five minutes. The total time for installation is about 30 minutes (i dont know why), but work!!!!.

 

Thank's again.

 

PD: Sorry by my english.

[BladeRunner 0]

Ouch!

30 minutes to update a driver, I have never seen anything take that long.

Seems there is probably something else wrong somewhere with your system - however you are up and running now and that is the main thing.

[Christianb 8]

Hi BladeRunner,

There are tons of articles about the "Click of Death", "Promissed free Technical Support and then charging for it", and creating a SCSI/Parallel device that isn't truly SCSI compliant, because unlike other SCSI devices it must be the only device on the chain instead of working compatibly with 15 other devices like every other SCSI product out there". Aciddenlty, stepping on my parallel port zip drive was the best thing that ever happened to it . Okay actually I wish I still had it for compatiblity reasons, but it'd probably just sit in my closet collecting dust any how. Also their drivers are unstable, and slow down the display of My Computer with their cutesy icons. The zip drive icon could simply be embedded in Explorer.exe, but they're too stupid and possibly afraid of the legal implications of doing so. In fact if you search this messageboard I'm sure you can find information about all of this, because it's come up before.

-Christian

[webe123 0]

Quote:

Hi BladeRunner,
There are tons of articles about the "Click of Death", "Promissed free Technical Support and then charging for it", and creating a SCSI/Parallel device that isn't truly SCSI compliant, because unlike other SCSI devices it must be the only device on the chain instead of working compatibly with 15 other devices like every other SCSI product out there". Aciddenlty, stepping on my parallel port zip drive was the best thing that ever happened to it ). Okay actually I wish I still had it for compatiblity reasons, but it'd probably just sit in my closet collecting dust any how. Also their drivers are unstable, and slow down the display of My Computer with their cutesy icons. The zip drive icon could simply be embedded in Explorer.exe, but they're too stupid and possibly afraid of the legal implications of doing so. In fact if you search this messageboard I'm sure you can find information about all of this, because it's come up before.
-Christian

Well I have an iomega zip 100 internal ATAPI drive in my computer NOW and it works great! Has for YEARS! Now that win xp has come out, it has the drivers for it on win xp! Now I don't know about their SCSI drives, never owned one, but I CAN say that this drive I have is a VERY reliable drive. I wouldn't call a WHOLE LINE of a companies products crap, unless you know what you are talking about!

[adamvjackson 0]

I personally have owned one zip drive, years ago, a parallel port zip-100, and I never had any problems, but I have had a few of my friends' drives have the "click of death".

[philbarnes 0]

i'd like to concur with webe123 - my zip100 works fine under xp and has given me no trouble ever. unlike my favourite device ever the 3.5" floppy...

[Christianb 8]

webe123 and philbarnes,

Let me see here, while I'm glad that your two product work fine. I don't think personal experience counts for much. When compared to a the large number of lawsuits that have rightfully been brought up against this company in relation to their customer service practices. So do you know their customer service history? Obviously not. Otherwise you wouldn't be speaking in their defense. I know of no other company in the computer hardware industry with such a bad record. Why don't you find some articles, read them, and then tell me how you feel about IOmega

 

Click of Death:

Announcing Iomega Class Action

 

The law firm of Dodge, Fazio, Anderson, and Jones, P.C. has announced that a nationwide class action was commenced on September 10, 1998 in the Superior Court of New Castle County in Delaware on behalf of all owners of the Iomega Zip Drive. The complaint contains claims for breach of warranty, negligence in manufacturing and design, consumer fraud, and for failure to warn. Iomega, which is a Delaware corporation, has been selling the Zip Drive (the "Drive") for over three years. A substantial number of Zip Drives have developed a problem commonly known as the “Click of Death,” which renders the Drive useless and damages the disk such that any data on the disk is lost. It appears that the Click of Death can damage an otherwise unaffected Drive by the use of a disk that is already corrupted.

 

I should also mention that it wasn' like only a few users were affected, because out of 250,000 defective drives the disks from those defective drives (which both my dad and I each had) were shared with working drives and infected countless more, perhaps doubling or quadrupling that figure. If you do a search on Google for "Zip Click of death" you'll find 244,000 web pages all complaining about this so you know it's an unquestionably enormous issue.

 

Zip Plus - I don't do SCSI, but I am scsIOmega Compliant.

SCSI Devices by their very nature are designed to work on a chain (series of cables, one in and one out) with 7 to 15 other devices (depending on the version of SCSI). The Zip Plus was a great idea, most people at the time it came out wanted SCSI for speed, but if they were going to bring the drive to a friend's house that didn't have SCSI then they also wanted parrallel. The trouble is a Zip Plus is about as SCSI as I am an olympic athelete. The ZIP PLus will only work on a SCSI chain of only one device so it isn't actually SCSI Compliant. Suppose I made an IDE (ATA133 or slower)hard drive that wouldn't work with a slave. That wouldn't really be an IDE drive either, without a disclaimer. There was no disclaimer on the ZIP plus packaging. Nor were there refunds issued for false advertising.

 

Quote:

5/5/98

 

Iomega ZipPlus incompatibility can corrupt data on your drive

 

From a MacWEEK article: Iomega's ZipPlus drive should only be used with the AutoDetect cable that ships with it. Using other cables can lead to data corruption. For example, this "precludes the drive's use with PowerBooks, which have a special SCSI adapter cable."

 

See what Iomega has to say about this Zip Plus drive [i would include this link, but IO Mega removed their deceitful product announcement, ah to hell with it here's where it used to be

 

Do they really think they can get away with this???

 

The Zip Plus cannot be used in a SCSI chain with other devices, it cannot be used with any cable converter, gender changers. This rules out its use in any wide or ultra wide SCSI card setup.

 

Iomega's "Customer Service" offered the following "Deal": Iomega will exchange the Zip Plus for an external Zip Drive and 6 Zip disks (to compensate for the extra $100 spent on the Plus). The exchange offer is valid only while the Zip Plus is under warranty.

 

 

 

Why should I exchange the Zip Plus for an external SCSI Zip and 6 Zip disks?

 

This Drive is NOT acceptable!!!

This is not how this product was advertised, boxed, or sold.

This is not why we bought the Zip Plus Drive.

Iomega has built a device that does not work correctly, and now seems to think that they can change the manual to fit their screw up.

 

It appeared that Iomega has NO plans to "fix" the Zip Plus hardware or firmware to allow it to be used as a part of a SCSI chain or with pin converters on wide or ultra wide SCSI cards.

 

In my opinion, Iomega should discontinue sale of the Zip Plus Drive, until a time when and if they can build a Zip Plus drive that really works.

 

.ZIP, ZIP Drive, eh what's the difference?:

Night and day .ZIP is a file compression format invented by PKWare over 10 years ago, it's also the second most widely used file distribution format shy of self-extracting .exes. For a number of years it was number one.

 

A Zip drive is a poorly designed, defective product, with unstable drivers, no toll free technical support (even though the box said so) and a confusing name. A Zip drive is a removable disk based device and has nothing to do with ZIP compression, nor does it integrate ZIP compression into the design and or original software in any way.

 

I am personally amazed that PKWARE didn't seek fiscal and brand name damages for IOmegas clear theft of the ZIP file name. I wish there was some way to measure how many stupid users bought a zip drive simply because they'd heard good things about zip files and assumed that a ZIP Drive was what their friends were talking about.

 

We Could Have Been Number 1

Lastly the zip drive could have replaced floppy drives as the new storage medium if they'd just charged 40 dollars for the drives and no more than 5 for each disk. Oh well it was bad technology anyhow Viva CD/RWs with Mount Ranier Technology.

 

We don't honor our boxes free Technical Support claims or your Rebate Applicaions

Just read it I'm tired of typing

 

Now who knows what they're talking about again? I forget? Of course I'm sure both of you were aware of all of this?

I'm sorry I didn't intend for this to an I told you so, but you both really need a big heads up on IOmega the worst company in the computer hardware industry today.

 

-Christian Blackburn

[BladeRunner 0]

"Class Action" Hummm, well that is new, I mean, it is every day in the US somebody decides to do something like this.

It is just a matter of course and doesn't actually prove anything.

 

The part about "ZIP Plus" not being SCSI.

Well this is actually a fault of the SCSI controllers.

A lot of SCSI cards have issues when you chain both internal and external devices together.

If you read through the Adaptec documentation you'll see this is listed as an issue - If you've got an Internal SCSI chain then you'll only be able to use one external device or in some cases no external devices on the same controller.

 

I've owned 3 ZIP drives (1x Parallel Port, 1x IDE Internal 1x SCSI Internal) and I'll add that to the numerous ZIP drives I've used at various places or work and I'm still yet to see one fail.

[Christianb 8]

Hi BladeRunner,

Well it sounds like I learne something new about the SCSI interface, but I am still not sure I agree that IOmega isn't still at fault. What you are describing sounds like a heterogenous chain issue, but even if you had a dedicated external chain there can only be one device on it, the Zip Minus, so no SCSI scanners, printers, or other drives.

 

My Dad was backing up his computer and 10/12 disks failed that was a 200 dollar media problem. Not mention that the drive had the click of death so that adds about another 120 to the issue. Making it a 320 dollar failure. I had an Epson Parrallel zip and aside from being ungodly slow it suffered the click of death too after my dad innocently mailed me a disk from Cali with family photos on it. I was living in WA at the time. Not only that, but Zip disks are low density HD platters and are highly fragile and volitile, because they're magnetic. That's why everyone has switched to optical media, although I will definetly admit that price was the biggest motivator IOmega got greedy. Greed has destroyed more companies than I care to remember. Ever heard of NextOS or OS/2? Who's using them now? Darn near nobody.

-Christian

[Christianb 8]

In any event I think we're both arguing a moot point. Zip Drives are over. Thank God!

-Christian