- 2.2 GB parallel port removable-media drive
- True portability
- Fast data transfer rate
- MR technology gives you years of secure, trouble-free operation
- Capacity to back up most hard drives on one ORB disk
Technical Details
Product Details
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Product Description
Amazon.com Product Description
Castlewood System's ORB2PE01 is a compact 2.2 GB parallel port drive that you can take anywhere along with its pocket-size removable disks. Large enough to back up most hard drives on one disk, ORB's disks are infinitely rewritable. Data transfers are as fast as 2 MBps. State-of-the-art MR technology gives you years of secure, trouble-free operation.
From Winmag®
Unseating the Iomega Jaz 2GB drive in speed and price is Castlewood System's ORB drive. With a 2.2GB capacity, the $199 ORB is about $100 less than the Jaz, and the $30 replacement cartridges are nearly one-third the price of the Jaz's.
The ORB's performance is a winner, too. We compared average read/write speed of the ORB internal IDE drive (parallel, USB and FireWire interfaces are promised for the future) with an external SCSI Jaz drive. The Jaz should have been faster but, in fact, the 5400rpm ORB pulled in front at 1.24MB per second vs. the Jaz's 0.61MBps on our standard file copy test. At that speed, the ORB rivals some hard drives.
Castlewood includes several utilities, such as drive and cartridge status, and disk eject. But more useful are an image-copy drive utility and the professional backup utility, which lets you choose files and which copied at a rate of 1.98MBps (there is no compression option). These utilities are available from a program group or by right-clicking on the drive's icon within Windows.
Our only concern: Castlewood is a brand-new company, and during the past two years, the product has been repeatedly delayed. As with many new, price-leading products, finding the drives (or, more critically, blank media) might be problematic.
Customer Reviews
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
32 of 33 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good, fast, cheap storage,
By Jupiter Jones (Nashville, TN) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Castlewood Systems ORB2PE01 2.2GB Parallel Port Removable Media Drive (Personal Computers)
Remember when you got your Zip drive and suddenly floppies seemed, well, puny? After a bit of time with the Orb drive, you'll feel the same way about your Zips.The two devices are in about the same price range and are both available in external and internal configurations. The Orb media is two to three times more expensive (for now), but look at it this way--you could hold 20 Zip disks on one Orb disk! Add the fact that the Orb drive is as fast (or faster) than many for-real hard drives, and you've got a winner. My one complaint? The fiddly door on the front keeps dropping down, getting in the way, and makes swapping disks a bit of a hassle. A small price to pay, however, for 2.2 gigs of fast, removable storage. I've had mine for a month now, and it continues to work like a charm.
15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great Product despite reported problems,
By A Customer
This review is from: Castlewood Systems ORB2PE01 2.2GB Parallel Port Removable Media Drive (Personal Computers)
Purchased this drive about two months ago and have found it to be the best (and cheapest) option for massive amounts of storage. Despite some reported problems in various reviews, I have not had even one problem with this drive and routinely use it to back up my hd and to store multimedia like MP3's. At $ for each 2.2gig cartridge, the ORB can't be beat!
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Orb is AMAZING,
By A Customer
This review is from: Castlewood Systems ORB2PE01 2.2GB Parallel Port Removable Media Drive (Personal Computers)
I bought my Orb drive for home use on the same day that I picked up a Zip drive for use at work. I cannot begin to describe how different these two products are. The Orb behaves almost exactly like a hard drive. It's very, very fast. The only noticeable difference is the slight spin time (which you can adjust through the software). The Zip (while the media may be ubiquitous) is really too small to be useful these days. The addition of the 250 mb model is a step in the right direction, but it's clear that Iomega dropped the ball here. Castlewood has bridged the gap between the capacity of the very slow tape backup drive and the convenience of a removeable disk.
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