Re: GSTape still available?

[gdr@eddore.myrias.com (Devin Reade)]

In article <553e98$hui@Venus.mcs.net>, J. L. Walters <bird@MCS.COM> wrote:
>
>Why I don't like GSTape
>
>1. The tapes are somewhat hard to get and somewhat expensive. For my
>   tape unit they hold 60Meg (as I remember), so you can't put two
>   full 32 meg partitions on one tape unless one or more is not full.

This is more a factor of your selection of tape drives than it is
of GSTape.  I'm using 525Meg QIC tapes which retail for about CDN $30,
or about US $25.  I'm reasonably sure you could put a 4G DAT drive
on your IIgs and have GSTape run it.

BTW, the 525M size is handy in that it allows me to make backups when
I'm sleeping or otherwise not at my IIgs, as there is no changing of
tapes.  :)

>2. If you put more than one partition on the tape it takes forever to
>   write the second and subsequent partitions [...]

I haven't experienced that one, mainly because I use one tape per
backup session, even if there is room left over on it.  Sometimes
tapes go bad and I wouldn't want to lose more than one level of
backups due to one bad tape.

>Why I liked GSTape:
> [...]
>2. When it comes to restoring a single file, a subdirectory, or the 
>   entire partition it was obvious (after RTFM), what you should do.

Agreed.  GSTape has saved my on many occasions.  I used to use ProSEL-16
for backups, but it can't handle HFS volumes.  Further, the floppy
shuffle was deadly, even when I only had 40Meg.

-- 
	Devin Reade	gdr@eddore.myrias.ab.ca