Robertdkeys@aol.com wrote:

> It seems that the last of my tk50 tapes are going belly up,
> and becoming unreadable.  I would like to find some way
> to hook up Cipher 9 track scsi tape decks to my MVIII.

At least you don't have to clean the drive every day ;-)

> They are infinitely more reliable that the tk50 drives.
> I am using a couple of scsi mscp HD controllers, so the
> thoughty occurred to me to try to find a way to bring up
> the Cipher decks on the ol' qbus critter, if that is doable.

If you have a "couple" os SCSI MSCP controllers, are you sure none of 
those support tape drives too ?

> Also, are there any new manufacture TK50 tapes
> available.  I am beginning not to want to trust old
> ones that have been sitting on the shelf for years
> and years.

Just copy the old tapes to new media. You'll probably spend to much 
money for new tk50 tapes, and the tape drive is not getting better ...