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◊        Necro
          MacAddict Hacker Editor

Why are we writing an article on Iomega Zip drives?  Because this is a big problem for many iomega users, including myself.  This has happened to my 3 times and its time for a magazine to publish it.  Because Iomega spends $$ advertising in most computer magazines, they wont print bad stuff about Iomega, but guess what?  We at MacAddict Hacker can say anything we want!  Hehe.  

Instead of shipping your drive back to Iomega, heres what I did.  Purchase a new Zip Drive, bring it home, wait like 2 days, pop the broken zip drive in the box and return it and say: 

"this thing is broken, it keeps clicking, I read that this is a problem for zip drives so I just want my money back."

It works.  No waiting for a new drive through Iomega, and no shipping costs.  Also because you can have a new zip drive the next day at the store, theres no down time.  The stores can afford to ship stuff back to iomega alot cheaper that we can.  Let them do it.  They proubly have an entire case of em going back.  Hehe.  Enjoy the article.

◊         Press Icon to Hear the
           Iomega Click of Death

(For those of you who this has happened to you are proubly laughing your head off at that sound byte because you know what that sound is.)

Iomega "Click Of Death"

What is this monster?  Well if you have a zip drive you are proubly familiar with this problem. 

Also known as the "Click of Death" and "Whacked Drive", the "Click Death" has been suspected to affect Iomega Zip Drives and disks.  Some users of the Iomega Jaz drive have also reported having similar problems, although not as commonly. 

The problem has been notoriously called Click Death because Iomega Zip drives first start making clicking sounds persistently. It is also feared that a Zip drive with Click Death may spread its problem to other Zip drives when an affected disk is shared with others. The signs of Click Death may include a combination of the following symptoms:

    Repetitive clicking noises occur when reading disks 

    Affected Zip compatible disk become write-protected 
       (cannot save or delete files) or simple cannot be accessed.

    Information of directories or files become corrupted.

Visit the Iomega Click of Death (Unofficial) Web Site
http://www.thirdeyesp.com/jatin/iomega/

Letters from Iomega Click of Death Customers

Name: Robert Henke 
Subject: clicking death

Both internal SCSI Zip drives got clicking death. Iomega replaced both and they have worked fine. If a diskette gets clicked, I don't use it again or try it in another drive. The drive that clicked goes back to Iomega. I'm still under warrenty and Iomega sends me a replacement under their exchange program. I tell Iomega that it clicks and they don't ask any further questions. I don't keep anything valuable on a Zip disk. I also have a parallel Zip drive that has had no problems. I wish the major magazines would address this problem

Thanks Bob 

Name: Randy Harsey 
Subject: Another one bites the dust (CLICK-CLICK....

Hi, I bought the internal Zip 100 with the Zip Zoom SCSI. My experience with the clicking death was the same as the others I've read here. Out of seven disks I could only access two of them and that was after 30-50 clicks and then the same thing when I tried to access a folder within the disk. I finally just took it out so I would quit torturing myself trying to get something done about it.

Everytime I tried to contact Iomega through e-mail or various links, all I got was a message telling me that that address was not for support. Anyway, bottom line is, they know that they have a defective products, and they're trying to ignore the fact. I, for one, will NEVER buy another one of their products. 

Name: Paul Axford 
Subject: Comments

Great site! About time someone took the initiative. Iomega are in denial regarding this problem. I expect a reputable company to disclose known problems with their products and possible solutions, especially for a potential backup medium. The lack of email support and $15 potential fee is ridiculous for a hardware company.

Even though 1.44 floppies are not much better, at least they don't (usually) damage the drive when they fail.

Funny about the CLIK product. What ARE they thinking? A Freudian slip maybe?

Name: S. L. Johnson 
Subject: Click,click,click,click,&&&&~error! DEATH

I am very glad to have found this website. This problem really grinds me. We lost data (both our company's and some of our clients), money and a whole lot of time. Iomega is impossible to deal with and I am NOT going to PAY THEM to tell them that their product is defective.

Our "guru" had the same problem with his external zip drive and has quit using it and is advising all of his clients to replace theirs and prospective purchasers to not purchase ANY Iomega products. Further, it is a mission of ours to suggest withdrawal of participation in the company via any shareholder interest. Divest yourself of Iomega stock! Rotten place for your "stuff".

Gee, I was so excited over this product that I was on a waiting list to purchase my first one when they came out. And then bought another one. BOTH the "tools" disks are clicked-out so bad that they halt the computer cold. It takes a "reset" to get going again.

Name: Darryl Bryant
Subject: Clicking Death

I had a strange clicking from my zip drive a few days ago, as I found later it was the heads snapping back and forth trying to read the disk, I had just been moving data from the zip carts when on putting in the 4th disk in a row the drive started to make this loud clicking noise which it has never made before, from then on the disks were not readable, I tried hooking the drive to my Amiga scsi port and still nogo, I then rehooked it to the mac, and the drive worked for a while then went back to this loud clicking noise.

 OK so I had a dead drive, 2 years old, so I pulled the top off, removed the plate covering the drive heads and I find the problem, on the upper arm of the pickup heads there is a flexiable circuit attached to the rear half of the arm, from the head end of the arm are two enamel copper wires coming from the head then going into a yellow plastic insulator tube about 40 mm long, the wires then imerge from the insulator and fed onto the top of the arm and soldered to two of the four terminals on the flexiable circuit board, the yellow plastic insulator is held at the head end of the arm with metal crimps, at the other end there what appears to be a spot of hotmelt glue holding it to the arm,

THIS WAS LOOSE!, the small movement of the insulator tube flexing side to side as the heads move back and forth caused one of the wires of the upper head to break from the solder terminal, So I resoldered the wire, put a spot of slow set thick superglue on the original glue joint and few more spots along the insulator tube ( I want make sure this doesn't happen again) , I then reassemble the drive, plug it back into the mac, and now it works fine!

the lower insulator and wires should not have this problem, they are longer, glued in several places along the lower arm and loops up the the upper arm and the wires are soldered to the other two terminals

I posted this a month ago on the newgroup, my drive is still working fine, A friend of mine has been using folded business card jammed on top of the cart when he puts it in the drive, the only way he could get it to work, a few days ago his drive started clicking, he put a second cart in and same thing happened, so knowing my experiance with the drive, we open his up and discover that the top head has been sheared off!, that distroyed the two carts.

Conclusion:- if it starts clicking dont feed it more cart, they may get eaten!

Name: Dr. A from the Philippines
Subject: Click Death Problem

i bought an iomega zip drive went i visited the states last 1996. i thought i was buying a good product. i was wrong. i just learned now that i am also a victim of the click death menace. here in the philipines a lot of zip owners have the same problem but nobody can fix it. now i can't access my old files that i backed-up. i will never buy iomega products even if they were the last storage device company on the face of the earth.

Name: Nick
Subject: Zip

I experienced click death with my zip at work. At home, my other zip doesn't click, but if i try to save anything over 3mb to the drive it crashes my computer. I've had the drive for a year and this just started happening. Do you know a fix for this? It's making me crazy. I have a Powermac.
 
Information Disclaimer:
Since some of the messages and comments on this pages are simply opinion and fair comment towards Iomega's products, and are not meant to be definitive fact, readers should explore both sides of any views presented here. All views expressed are those of the original author or authors. The views are not necessarilly those of the MacAddict Hacker's owners or those of the publisher. Possible solutions to problems should be used with discretion and at your own risk.

*Iomega and Zip are registered trademarks of Iomega Corporation. All other companies and product names mentioned within these web pages are trademarks of their respective companies.

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