Iomega jealous of Panasonic USB drivers

See Yes, there are USB drivers for DOS...

Most of them thanked me for the pointer or confirmed that the driver did indeed work on their systems. Half a dozen readers were quick to point out that the latest Symantec/Norton Ghost "2003" (which I don't have), includes USB dos drivers. And a pair of readers also told me Iomega bundles their own USB dos drivers when you purchase an Iomega-branded external "USB 2.0 hard disk".

It was an Iomega employee, whose name I'll keep anonymous, who confirmed that, in fact, the drivers bundled with Norton/Symantec Ghost 2003 are the same Iomega drivers that they bundle with their hard disks. But he didn't seem to like my story about the Panasonic drivers, well, maybe he did, but at least not as much as the rest of the readers.

"Symantec Ghost 2003 has been shipping with an Iomega ASPIUSB DOS driver for over a year," he said. He then questioned my article by saying "This is old news". And ended with a somewhat childish argument "Iomega did it first".

I kindly explained to him - and to the other readers that pointed out the Ghost 2003 and the Iomega USB 2.0 hard disks - that my story's main goal was to point out the availability of Panasonic's "hidden gem" driver. Newsgroups and web site boards showed me that people who tested both drivers (Iomega's and Panasonic's) indicated that the Panasonic drivers had broader hardware support -including Cardbus. So it was logical for me to write a story about them, as it could help users of DOS-based partition-backup software, users of earlier versions of Norton Ghost, or those with their own IDE HDDs placed on inexpensive "do-it-yourself" IDE-USB enclosure converter kits, and to get access to their USB storage devices from the DOS prompt.

But I continued a nice friendly discussion with this reader from Iomega. His second message included a funny paragraph:

"Iomega licences our drivers to other companies. I am checking to see if the Panasonic driver might in fact be our Iomega drivers that we have licenced to them. If these drivers are distributed without our control it makes it hard to licence them to companies like Symantec."

What's next? I thought. "Iomega sues Panasonic?" Or maybe "Iomega sends "click of death" warning to Japan"?

I'm not betting my bald head, but it's very likely that Panasonic drivers are not based on Iomega drivers, as most users who compared both said that the Panasonic drivers are much better, with broader chipset compatibility and some unique features like scanning the Cardbus ports for USB controllers on the PCMCIA slots. I also think Panasonic Japan has enough brains "in house" to develop its own drivers and not depend on Iomega's.

In a third email, the Iomega reader seemed to agree:

" I am tending to believe they are separate from our Iomega drivers," he said. And added "I did not hear about them licensing our drivers. Thought I would check it out just to make sure."

All this talk about Iomega drivers got me thinking. Why such zeal on Iomega's part and this struggle to keep "its unique drivers"-which I think are totally unrelated to Panasonic's, away from the public and bundled with commercial software (Ghost 2003), or their own Iomega-branded USB 2.0 hard disks only?. I think I figured it out. It's simple. Do the sums.

I bought.

1.-A Samsung 120gb IDE hard disk (5400rpm, 2MB cache), one of the quietest hard disks you can find! (and don't forget about Samsung's 3 YEAR warranty). for which I paid $95 USD, -free ground shipping in the USA.

2. A Chinese IDE-to-USB2.0 5.25" external enclosure kit, for $29 + $15 S&H, -new- from an ebay seller.

Total: $140 USD (U.S. FOB price), for an external 120GB USB 2.0 hard disk.

Of course, you need knowledge of a screwdriver to setup the IDE drive inside the external enclosure. But that's about it. I think both Samsung and the Chinese IDE-USB enclosure manufacturer must have made a healthy -if tiny- profit with my purchases. Of course, Iomega could fit a 7200 rpm in their enclosure, but I seriously question the usefulness of it on a USB bus.

With the Panasonic drivers I wrote about, I could even use this USB 2.0 hard disk to backup HDD partitions after booting from dos recovery diskettes using my ancient PowerQuest Drive Image. I say "could" because I just haven't tried yet - I'm waiting until I can learn Japanese to fully understand the implications of the Panasonic USB-DOS drivers licence agreement.

Compare this with the "Iomega solution".

Iomega USB 2.0 external hard disk http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/searchtools/item-details.asp?sku=I21-8112 $229 + S&H (and only a 1-year warranty). !!!

So if you purchase an Iomega-branded 120GB USB 2.0 hard disk with its "exclusive" iomega-written drivers, you get the same functionality I got on my setup, for about $90 US dollars more, and 2 years less of hard disk warranty.

You can be thankful that Iomega's CEO doesn't seem to be like SCO's, otherwise they would have despatched a team of rabid lawyers parachuting over Panasonic's Tokyo offices by now.

Any Japanese readers from Panasonic? Can I get an interview with the Panasonic driver authors?. Let me know.. PS: I'm not related to Samsung or Panasonic in any way -I'm just a satisfied customer who spent his hard earned money on one of its hard disks. I also don't have any hidden agenda against Iomega, I'm a satisfied Iomega customer as well, with two Zip drives and one external Jaz. µ