NWA-PCUG 06/99 NewsLetter Article 18861 N. Hwy 112, Springdale, AR 72762-9303 Click of Death by Barbara Conn, CPCUG From 5/99 Capital PCUG Monitor Years ago I began hearing about the scary "blue screen of death." More recently I've been hearing about the "click of death" (COD). This is the sound an Iomega Zip or Jaz drive makes as it dies, destroying the data cartridge and the data on cartridges in the drive at the time of death or inserted into the drive subsequently. Several months ago I received e-mail from Steve Bass, President of the Pasadena IBM Users Group and the Home Office columnist for PC World. His Jaz drive had fallen victim to COD and he was surveying folks to get comments about their experiences with these drives. He intended to write about this problem in a future column. You'll find Bass's "The Click of Death Ate My Data" column in the March 1999 PC World. He reports that Zip drives are more vulnerable than Jaz drives. Sick drives need service from Iomega, there is no quick fix. Drive expert Steve Gibson, the creator of SpinRite, wrote Trouble in Paradise, described by Bass as an "exquisitely simple utility to test the failure potential of Zip and Jaz drives." It's small and free -- download it from Gibson's Web site at http://www.grc.com. Because it's not just my stuff -- it's our stuff! Barbara is CPCUG's Director of Corporate Communications, Editor of the Monitor and Chair of the Entrepreneurs and Consultants SIG. She can be reached at bconn@cpcug.org. If you don't have, or absolutely hate email, you can reach her at (202) 452-7484.