USB 2.0 (Zip 750 MB generation backwards compatible with USB 1.1 systems).USB 1.1 (Zip 100 MB and 250 MB generations).IDE True ATA (very early ATA internal Zip drives mostly sold to OEMs these drives exhibit software compatibility issues because they do not support the ATAPI command set).Zip drives were produced in multiple interfaces including: Later (USB, left) and earlier (parallel, right) Zip drives (media in foreground) The Zip drive was Iomega's third generation of products, different from Iomega's earlier Bernoulli Boxes in many ways, including the absence of the Bernoulli plate of the earlier products. Įarly-generation Zip drives were in direct competition with the SuperDisk or LS-120 drives, which hold 20% more data and can also read standard 3 + 1⁄ 2-inch 1.44 MB diskettes, but they have a lower data-transfer rate due to lower rotational speed. Typical desktop hard disk drives from mid-to-late 1990s revolve at 5,400 rpm and have transfer rates from 3 MB/s to 10 MB/s or more, and average seek times from 20 ms to 14 ms or less. The original Zip drive has a maximum data transfer rate of about 1.4 MB/s (comparable to 8× CD-R although some connection methods are slower, down to approximately 50 kB/s for maximum-compatibility parallel 'nibble' mode) and a seek time of 28 ms on average, compared to a standard 1.44 MB floppy's effective ≈16 kB/s and ≈200 ms average seek time.

The Zip disk uses smaller media (about the size of a 9 cm ( 3 + 1⁄ 2-inch) microfloppy, but more ruggedised, rather than the Compact Disc-sized Bernoulli media), and a simplified drive design that reduced its overall cost. A linear actuator uses the voice coil actuation technology related to modern hard disk drives. In the Zip drive, the heads fly in a manner similar to a hard disk drive. However, Zip disk housings are much thicker than those of floppy disks. The Zip drive is a 'superfloppy' disk drive that has all of the 3 + 1⁄ 2-inch floppy drive's convenience, but with much greater capacity options and with performance that is much improved over a standard floppy drive.

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