13th November 1988 Cipher Data Products Inc, San Diego last week announced an array of new tape drives, led by the 8.75 form factor GCR reel-to-reel drive that provides high performance in a smaller physical size than hitherto. It offers 800/1600/3200/6250 bits per inch density and transfers at 1Mbyteper-second in the GCR recording format, at 160Kbytes-per-second in Phase-Encoded […] Cipher Data Products Inc, San Diego last week announced an array of new tape drives, led by the 8.75 form factor GCR reel-to-reel drive that provides high performance in a smaller physical size than hitherto. It offers 800/1600/3200/6250 bits per inch density and transfers at 1Mbyteper-second in the GCR recording format, at 160Kbytes-per-second in Phase-Encoded format. Capacity is 270Mb with GCR and 92Mb with PE, and data compression techniques enable the capacity to be expanded. The tape streams at 100 inches per second and up to 1Mb cache is available. Features include autoload, autothread, front panel diagnostics and front panel graphical displays. Demonstration units are promised for second quarter 1989, and the drive will be $3,500 in quantity. The company also announced the ST320S drive with 320Mb capacity, 120 inches per sec-ond tape speed and a 2Mbyte-per- second transfer rate using SCSI-2. It incorporates the Emulex ESP high-performance SCSI chip set and a high-level error correction capability. Third quarter 1989 delivery, $643 in OEM quantities. The ST150S/90 has 150Mb capacity, 90 ips tape speed and SCSI transfer rate of 2Mbps using the ESP chip set. It also features Cipher’s new quarter-inch mechanical design and advanced electronics; first quarter 1989, $503 OEM. The ST60S has 60Mb capacity using the newly de-signed mechanical platform. Out first quarter; $438 OEM. The 540F/Plus is a full-height 5.25 drive with 150Mb capacity and QIC-02 interface based on Cipher’s Model 540F drive; it is shipping in volume and is also available as the 5400/Plus portable external subsystem for MS-DOS and PS/2 Micro Channel mach ines; $490 OEM, and $1,648 retail. And there are five new quarter-inch tape systems that operate on the same SCSI controller as Seagate SCSI disk drives – 55388S dual-drive portable tape module with two 150Mb drives: it is $3,000, first quarter. The PC60Si and PC150Si are half-height 60Mb and 150Mb for use inside MSDOS micros, and the 51130S and 51180S are low profile external counterparts, all five using the DTS technology developed with Seagate and Sytron. PC60Si is $1,300; no prices for the others.