*BSD News Article 2683


Return to BSD News archive

Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd
Path: sserve!manuel!munnari.oz.au!news.hawaii.edu!ames!decwrl!csus.edu!netcomsv!mork!hasty
From: hasty@netcom.com (Amancio Hasty Jr)
Subject: Re: Writing a driver for QIC-40, floppy controller tape drives
Message-ID: <19mma1m.hasty@netcom.com>
Date: Tue, 28 Jul 92 22:52:48 GMT
Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services  (408 241-9760 guest) 
References: <greg.712272225@hibp1.ecse.rpi.edu> <151sfdINNreh@network.ucsd.edu>
Keywords: QIC-40 tape

In article <151sfdINNreh@network.ucsd.edu> brian@ucsd.edu (Brian Kantor) writes:
>In article <greg.712272225@hibp1.ecse.rpi.edu> greg@ecse.rpi.edu (Greg) writes:
>>   Meanwhile, I wonder if anyone has any info on this type of drive. Right now,
>
>The documents describing the QIC interfaces are available from Quarter
>Inch Cartridge Standards, Inc, somewhere in the Bay Area on 805-963-3853.
>
>QIC-40 and QIC-80 apparently describe the tape formats.  QIC-117 is the
>floppy-controller-style interface.  Or so the people at Colorado Memory
>Systems say.
>
>I don't know how much they standards cost.  Our library has copies, but
>they're checked out right now so I haven't seen them.

The standards are for free! Just give the Standards a call an request
the standards --- thats all what I did to get the standards.

>From what I heard from different sources QIC-40 is not easy to implement
(which can be construed as a challenge), also the QIC-40 demands stringent
timing constraints as to when to respond to the tape drive.

I know that sounds blasphemous but I am wondering if there is a dos
program capable of reading unix/file system which we can use to help us
backup our unix file systems. Currently, I have colorado tape drive
collecting dust and 300 MBs of binaries/sources. Not a pleasant scenario!


Cheers,
amancio