[rescue] QIC Tape Archival

[Kurt Nowak]

Cameron,

Just be very careful before you go down this road. There is more to this
than just finding someone with an operational streamer. These old tapes
very likely have bad drive bands as they are now decades old. It's been an
issue everyone is having with these old cartridges...As an initial health
test, if you spin the drive wheel on the cartridge, can you see the tape
move freely? If there is resistance then the drive band is likely glued to
the oxide layer which is bad news and will likely snap as soon as your
steamer tries to read it. Don't force it!. Hopefully it's been re-wound and
the oxide data layer isn't in contact with the band. Even if it moves
freely there is no guarantee that it will survive the transfer without
snapping and creating a big tape salad in your cartridge. You might also
want to ask someone in the cctalk mailing list who has more advanced
techniques than using a plain QIC streamer. Some folks have used
techniques, such as baking the tapes in the oven and replacing the old
drive bands with plasti-bands. Both have risks.

-Kurt

On Tue, Dec 3, 2024 at 11:40 AM Cameron Kelly via rescue <rescue at sunhelp.org>
wrote:

> Hello,
>
> I’m based in Canada. I’d have to check what the costs are to ship, I don’t
> think it’ll be too expensive to ship over if it’s a small packet.
>
> Thanks,
> Cameron
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>
> > On Dec 3, 2024, at 2:31 PM, Patrik Schindler via rescue <
> rescue at sunhelp.org> wrote:
> >
> > Hello,
> >
> > I do have drives and willing to help, but where are you located? I'm in
> Germany.
> >
> >
> >> Am 03.12.2024 um 19:55 schrieb Cameron Kelly via rescue <
> rescue at sunhelp.org>:
> >>
> >> Hello everyone,
> >>
> >> I have a QIC DC6150 tape that I'm looking to get the contents off of
> and archive, and am wondering if anyone here would be willing to offer the
> service, or know of anyone who does. I have a drive of my own but I've been
> advised to let someone who knows what they are doing, do it, since I don't
> have any experience using them.
> >>
> >> The tape in question is an interesting CorelDraw for UNIX tape that I
> found at a thrift store earlier in the year and there doesn't seem to be
> any dump of it online.
> >>
> >> Thanks,
> >>
> >> Cameron
> >
> > :wq! PoC
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > rescue list - http://sunhelp.org/mailman/listinfo/rescue_sunhelp.org
>
> _______________________________________________
> rescue list - http://sunhelp.org/mailman/listinfo/rescue_sunhelp.org
>
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