This Cartridge is Loaded

SyQuest's latest removable-cartridge hard drive delivers excellent performance and a low cost.

Stan Miastkowski

Like the seemingly perpetual battle between Microsoft and Netscape over Web browsers, Iomega and SyQuest keep upping the ante of high capacity and low cost of their removable-cartridge hard drives. The latest salvo is SyQuest's long-delayed SyJet. Originally announced as holding 1.3 GB per cartridge, shipping drives will pack 1.5 GB per cartridge (compared to the Iomega Jaz's 1-GB cartridges). With competition keeping both companies' drives and cartridges priced alike, SyQuest currently holds the technology edge.

The SyJet is available in both internal and external SCSI versions packed with software for either PCs or Macs. There's also an external parall el-port SyJet, and SyQuest says an IDE version will be available later this year. I tested a preproduction external SCSI unit, hooking it up to an Adaptec 2940 PCI controller on a 133-MHz Pentium system. For direct comparison, I attached an external Iomega Jaz to the same controller.

Using a variety of tests, including copying huge Audio Video Interleave (AVI) files and running Adaptec's SCSIBench, I found (not surprisingly) that the SyJet's performance was almost identical to the Jaz's. Minimum sustained transfer for both drives was 3.3 MBps; maximum was 6.4 MBps.

The SyJet is well up to tough multimedia tasks. It has a switchable audiovisual (AV) mode that turns off the drive's read verify step. This makes considerable sense for audio or video files, where a constant, uninterrupted stream of data is essential, and it doesn't matter if a few bits are dropped along the way. With AV mode turned off, the drive will do 180 retries if needed. (The Iomega Jaz also allows y ou to turn off read verify.)

The PC-version SyJet I tested ships with drivers for DOS, Windows 3.X, and Windows 95. There's also a simple-yet-effective backup program and a suite of utilities for formatting, copying cartridges, and setting drive parameters. The single cartridge that comes with production units will include a selection of free software, although details were unavailable at press time. Also, the SyJet has a complete and detailed manual. The Jaz has only minimal foldout sheets.

With cartridge costs at 8 cents per megabyte (compared to 12 cents per megabyte for the Jaz), the SyJet makes storage more economical than ever.

---

Product Information

SyJet..........................$399.00 internal


...............................$499.00 external


...............................$529.00 parallel


...............................$124.99 1.5-GB cartridges

SyQues
t Technology, Inc. Fremont, CA
Phone:    (800) 245-2278
Phone:    (510) 226-4000
Fax:      (510) 226-4102
Internet: 
http://www.syquest.com

Circle 1055 on Inquiry Card.

HotBYTEs
 - information on products covered or advertised in BYTE

---

Ratings

Technology         ****
Implementation     ****
Performance        ****


Key:

***** Outstanding
**** Very Good
*** Good
** Fair
* Poor

---

External Storage from SyJet

photo_link (38 Kbytes)

External (shown here) and internal SyJet drives use the same 1.5-GB removable cartridge.

---

Stan Miastkowski is a BYTE consulting editor who's been poking around inside computers for almost two decades. You can reach him at stanm@bix.com .