[TUHS] Several QD-600A Tapes from Bell Labs Circa Early 90s

[Clem Cole]

Be really careful.  The bands inside are extremely fragile.  Talk to me off
list.  I have a 2 drives that are likely to be to can read them [Archive
Viper 150], which I have spliced to a SCSI chain on a FreeBSD box.  Talk to
me off list.

Clem

On Wed, May 28, 2025 at 3:58 PM segaloco via TUHS <tuhs at tuhs.org> wrote:

> Hello everyone, I'm just putting feelers out for a potential data recovery
> project that may have some UNIX history nuggets hiding somewhere.  I just
> closed
> on this auction: https://www.ebay.com/itm/267254963191
>
> After the link is an action for a set of 17 Sony QD-600A tapes featuring
> various
> backups from at least one machine named Zeus.  The listing indicates they
> were
> property of a former Western Electric engineer.  At least one tape has a
> label
> indicating a full /usr backup.  My hope is that something downstream of
> the BTL
> internal version of System V might be living amongst these tapes, but
> either way
> I was wondering if anyone here with access to the correct tape drive would
> be
> willing to assist with ripping these tapes?  I can also start hunting down
> a
> drive but figured I'd ask around first.  I'm not currently spotting a
> drive on
> eBay but have a few other places I can ask around.
>
> Thanks for any input!
>
> - Matt G.
>
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