Zip disks
100 MB, 250 MB and 750 MB Zip cartridges. Two-decade-old magnetic media. At present, obtaining access to functional reader hardware is significantly harder than the recovery skill itself.
Most common
Old Zip disks, Jaz cartridges and first generation external hard drives are now decades old, and what is on them has usually been forgotten rather than duplicated. This is exactly why these arrive; because you have found an old box and realised what was in it.
Iomega was shut down and became part of LenovoEMC. As such, there will be no new firmware, drivers or replacement enclosures available for your older units. We do however get many perfectly serviceable disks stranded behind a dead bridge board.
This phrase has become common usage and the underlying failure is worth understanding.
Old Zip drives had heads that fly close to a flexible disk inside the cartridges. If the head becomes misaligned or damaged, it can physically harm the cartridge that you place inside the drive and once a cartridge is damaged by a drive's head it will damage the next drive you insert it into.
It was the propagation of the fault that made it infamous. This wasn’t just an individual failure, but rather a failure mechanism that could be replicated by everyone working through all of their remaining cartridge collections attempting to locate one that functioned, and damaging each in turn. The audible "click" produced when the read/write heads repeatedly tried to determine their location became known as the "click of death."
This is still true today in terms of the physical outcome of using a faulty Zip disk: if a Zip cartridge clicks, do not put another one in that drive, nor should you attempt to use that Zip disk in another drive. Whatever you have left is worth more than the diagnosis.
100 MB, 250 MB and 750 MB Zip cartridges. Two-decade-old magnetic media. At present, obtaining access to functional reader hardware is significantly harder than the recovery skill itself.
1 GB and 2 GB rigid-disk-based Jaz cartridge removable hard drives — which are subject to the same type of mechanical failure as other removable hard-disks.
Later USB or FireWire versions that contain a traditional spinning drive. Recovered just like any external; but the bridge fails as often as the disk.
Network storage produced by Iomega and eventually owned by both EMC & Lenovo. Standard Linux-based storage system to recover like any other NAS.
Honest assessment of longevity of magnetic storage over decades.
Flash loses its charge in time while unplugged. Magnetic media, however, is genuinely durable and stable for a very long time in reasonable conditions. This is why twenty-year-old Zip disks frequently read perfectly.
Degradation happens with respect to anything surrounding the magnetic field. The lubricant used on the disks can break down; the flexible base material can warp; the adhesive within the cartridge can begin to migrate; and exposure to moisture and temperature both increase the rate at which degradation occurs. A cartridge sitting in a loft has undergone a tougher existence than the one in a cupboard and it is going to show it.
Therefore, when asked "has it reached the end of its useful life," it's generally "no" but storage conditions play a much larger role than age itself. A cartridge that was previously involved in a failing unit is obviously going to be a different situation for you from one that has simply collected dust since purchase.
That is exactly why the brand is so well known for their ability to propagate damage. A single bad unit can work through a full collection of cartridges.
If you have several, please send them together. If one cartridge is damaged it is likely to be part of a larger group which may hold overlapping content.
There is a scarcity of working Zip and Jaz equipment at present which is an issue we need to resolve rather than yourself. In Manchester cards, cartridges and other legacy media are from £250 plus VAT after a free 48-hour diagnostic.
Yes, frequently. Magnetic storage media is robust and twenty-year-old cartridges often read perfectly. What matters most concerning a cartridge’s longevity is its environment in storage – a cartridge stored in a loft has likely been subjected to harsher storage conditions than one kept in a cupboard.
It was possible for a Zip drive with a misaligned or damaged head to physically damage cartridges inserted into it, and if a cartridge was damaged by being inserted into a drive with such a head, it would subsequently damage the next drive it was placed in. Thusly, this spread throughout collections and the clicking sound produced when the head searched for correct positioning earned it the nickname.
Do not insert another cartridge into the drive or put that cartridge into a different drive, and stop testing the unit immediately. Damage will propagate both ways so what remains is potentially worth more than simply proving your diagnosis.
Zip & Jaz are both very rare working units today so please don’t worry about getting them read; simply send the cartridges to us and we will handle reading them.
Magnetic material is extremely resilient – the real issues are surrounding it including lubricants on the surfaces failing, plastic substrates becoming distorted and adhesives migrating etc. All these factors are greatly exacerbated by high temperatures and humidity.
Cartridges and removable media costs start at £250 + VAT after the first 48 hours of free diagnostic work. Please always send all the cartridges from the same ‘set’ rather than a single cartridge.