It felt like a shame MD Data [1] didn't catch on - but with existing MO formats out there maybe there was no point.

I was also reminded today of Floptical [2] drives, which I vaguely remember hearing about (but didn't catch on either).

Finally, there is my personal niche favourite, DataPlay [3], which were just so small and cute.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MD_Data [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floptical [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DataPlay

There was a predecessor to the Zip Drive that could do 120 MB. I’m blanking on what it’s called. My friend who was into MD data was into those first, then Iomega killed them.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SuperDisk was 120 MB, but it came after the Zip drive, not before.

The ones that came before the Zip were the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernoulli_Box , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floptical , and various flavors of magneto-optical: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magneto-optical_drive

Interestingly that article says Iomega was working in these five fore the Zip drive and abandoned the idea for Zip, others picked it up and ran with it.

But the article asserts they came out in 1997 - with no citation, and my friend had moved by 1996 so I think that date is off by a year or so. Though given where he worked it’s theoretically possible someone have him a prerelease version as a developer prototype.

Edit: PC Mag claims 1996 https://www.pcmag.com/encyclopedia/term/ls-120

And the NYT says March 1996: https://www.nytimes.com/1996/03/11/business/3m-chases-the-dr...