Connecting Old Mac Iomega Zip to Mac Mini

I don't know about his being a common question. At least not in this decade. 🙂 My G4 has a Zip drive but it dates from 2002.

I can't remember if Zip drives required a special driver for which I 99.999% suspect there is no El Capitan version. There may have been one included in the operating system back with OS9 but since people stopped using Zip disks a long time ago it may not be featured in a newer OS.

As I remember this, the Zip drives required a custom Scuzi(?) drivers. At this point in time, I would suggest a search a third-party service that can convert your Zip disk files to format that is recognizable to moden computers.

It's not a parallel port connection.

They had a SCSI connection, not a parallel port connection. The connectors are the same, but the connection is not. There were no USB to SCSI adapters. There were some Firewire to SCSI adapters, the Ratoc one comes to mind, but they have long been out of production.

Your best bet would be to find someone with a still working museum piece Mac that had a built in SCSI port, i.e., a Power Mac G4 MDD. They may be able to retrieve the files for you.

I'm trying to recover some important files from those bygone days.

Important files should not be left to obsolete storage systems.

CORRECTION: Ratoc did make a SCSI to USB2 adapter, but it is also discontinued.

http://www.ratocsystems.com/english/products/U2SCX.html

See also: http://www.ebay.com/bhp/scsi-usb-adapter

Some now very old Macs had built-in internal ZIP drives and as I recall these would have been using an IDE connection. Towards the end of the ZIP drive era it would have been possible to get an external ZIP drive which used a USB interface. In theory these would still work today on a Mac.

Macs have never had built-in Parallel interfaces and as a result the support for Parallel devices even via adapters have been very poor. I would not therefore be surprised to see it not working. I don't recall there ever being a SCSI version of a ZIP drive so I do believe the one you have is parallel rather than SCSI. (Don't get confused with SyQuest drives.)

Your best option might be to look for a second hand USB ZIP drive, it can read the same disks as the drive you have. There seem to be ones regularly listed on eBay.

I don't recall there ever being a SCSI version of a ZIP drive so I do believe the one you have is parallel rather than SCSI.

Incorrect, the picture that I previously posted is of the back of a ZIP drive showing the 2 ports which allowed the daisy chaining of SCSI devices.

CORRECTION: Previous picture was of the parallel port version. However, it looks like they were sold in both configurations, parallel and SCSI, see below:

I was going to say the fact that the original photo had connectors with different genders suggested it was a pass-thru parallel connection not a daisy-chain SCSI which as your new picture shows has identical gender connectors.

Still the original point of my reply applies, neither Parallel or SCSI is going to be practical on current Macs so you need to look for a second hand USB model.

Yep, my bad.

Those Zip Drives with USB only, if found in used or NOS unopened packaging

may prove as unreliable now as they did when new. I have one, that failed after

a few days (mostly sitting) and a non-computer vendor had no additional stocks.

{So many 100/250 Zip Disks in my possession, chose to fail; some content

had been backed up to rotational hard drives inside enclosures. My B&W G3

350 was equipped with 250MB Zip Drive. A kit included new faceplate.}

So I still have a USB unit, in original plastic; the USB cable was re-purposed. 😐

Every five years I do a technology review. Eight years ago I made sure that all my files I have on floppy disks and zip disks were transferred to my hard drives. Three years ago I started transferring files I had archived on CDs and DVDs to archival hard drives. I also make sure the hard drives were SATA and not IDE. Of course none of this is permanent but it never will be. I also try to make sure files are stored in some long-lasting base format so they can be open by future software versions. I may never need to open the WordStar term paper I wrote in grad. school 30 years ago but there is a copy in .txt format just in case I do. I also figure that .jpg format files will still be around for most of the remainder of my lifetime.

From experience with electronics and failures related to most associated products

and services (in this geographical area) due to a variety of issues, I've learned to not

worry so much about the transitory stuff and fluff of ones life.

And have written off most of the time wasted here (on Earth) so far, as an accidental

placement by God. Cannot blame anything or anyone if your magic boxes all fail.

You can blame yourself if you commit too much of a limited lifespan to these toys.😝

{About the best Zip Drives I had were SCSI 100GB, used them across many early

Macs. Except for the need to have a termination unit on the end of the Chain, the

idea was rather good. Never had a Parallel or PC version. - A few 250 drives could

read the 100 discs; but not the other way around. Alas, another form of vaporware.}

Some of my older Macs still use & require ATA/IDE (PATA) so I also have external

backup FW enclosures with those; probably not for much longer. A near Mint iBook

G4 12-inch 1.33GHz Mid-2005, and a Late 2005 Mac Mini (1.5GHz) still do well.