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From: kaxiras@falcons.cs.wisc.edu (Stefanos Kaxiras)
Subject: A case for QIC-80
Message-ID: <kaxiras.749938489@cs.wisc.edu>
Summary: QIC-80 is useful
Keywords: QIC-80
Sender: news@cs.wisc.edu (The News)
Organization: U of Wisconsin Madison - Computer Sciences
Date: Wed, 6 Oct 1993 20:14:49 GMT
Lines: 49


Hello,

I've read some posts describing the problems associated with QIC-80
device drivers. As I understand such a driver would take up most CPU
cycles because of timing constraints. It's going to be worthless in
network back up. Tar is going to suffer because of no I/O and computation
overlap ... etc. etc.

OK. Fine. People who want to do this stuff can spend $$$ to buy
SCSI controllers and drives.

A point that was not taken into consideration is that QIC-80 minicartridges
are a *great* distribution medium.

I want to get FreeBSD. What are my options :

1) Ftp it, buy a hundred floppies, download it on them, move  them
on my PC and install it. Or buy the distribution on floppies and install it.

2) Spend $$$ buy a SCSI controller and a SCSI tape drive or a CD-ROM drive
spend some more $$$ and get the tape or CD-ROM.

I can't do (2)-no money-  and it's a big hassle to do (1).
Who wants a system in 100 diskettes ? 
I believe that both options inhibit people of getting FreeBSD

So what I argue for is this :

Forget for the moment writing a driver that will make 
a QIC-80 tape drive behave like any other SCSI tape drive. 

Just write up something that can be used to install BSD -and other
software -from QIC-80 minicatridges. 
Instead of using the floppy drive for the installation use the tape 
drive connected to the floppy drive controller !

Even if the tape drive behaves exactly like the floppy drive it's pretty
useful!

Later on we can tackle the problem of doing more with the QIC-80 drives.

I believe that many people woule be happy to be able to install
FreeBSD from QIC-80 tapes. This would lead to a wider acceptance of FreeBSD.

Thanks for reading,
Stefanos.