Iomega 31310 Zip 250 MB USB-Powered Drive

Unfortunately, I had to purchase this product because of legacy media I owned. I would have preferred not to, but it does function well.

This is a great product. The Zip drive is a much better alternative to the Floppy Drive and just as good as a USB Drive for data backup. I use this on my work desktop and it is great to store important files I don't trust backing up on a floppy. It is also durable and bigger than a USB drive, so I don't have to worry about loosing it.

Like an earlier reviewer I think a product like this should work for more than three years (I'd say at least seven.) But I didn't even get three years out of mine. Unfortunately I bought one in late 2001. It was used on a fairly regular basis for about a year and a half. I hadn't used it since 2003. I recently took it out to retrieve some files and it would not work. Plugged it in, CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK WHIRRRR - cannot read disk - LED blinks continuosly. So while it's been more than three years since I bought the unit I'd say I got something like 2 years of normal usage. It's dead now, and I wouldn't dream of spending $120~$175 to replace it. I'm only considering a replacement purchase to be able to retrieve a few of the files. Basically this is an obsolete product with far superior and cost effective alternatives available.

If I do find a low cost replacement I will quickly retrieve my data and archive it onto DVDR and resell the unit if I can.

In 2001 this drive served a purpose -BFD (before flash drives.) But I wouldn't recommend this technology in 2007.

I'm a long time user of Iomega zip drives. My first computer had an internal 250MB zip drive installed in it. Over the years I've built up quite a collection of zip disk with files stored on them. I bought the external zip drive so I would still be able to access all of those files with my new computer.

(...) My new PC uses Windows Vista as the OS, and I was pleasantly surprised to see that there was no need to install the driver that was supplied with the zip drive. Windows Vista knew what to do with it soon after I plugged in the USB cable.

The external version is noisier then the internal dive I used for so many years, and it also takes longer to write to, or read files from it. However, the product has been trouble free so far, I've had it a couple of months, and I would recommend it. There is newer technology out there that is both faster, and has a greater storage capacity, but the 250MB zip drive has performed the task I bought it for with no problems.

This drive is so simple to connect and use. It also takes up very little space. I also enjoy the space-saving storage of its floppy drive sized media. Overall - a great buy!