Many years ago a teacher told our class of computer techs that there are only two types of hard drives: dead hard drives, and hard drives which haven't died yet. This example is not only a dead hard drive, but it was sold by a company specializing in cheap hard drives, which actually charged customers a fee for warranty replacements. Yes, this is a 1997 example of an IDE hard drive from the short-lived company JTS Corporation, sometimes known as JT Storage
"JT" stands for Jugi Tandon, who invented the double-sided floppy drive and founded a floppy and hard drive manufacturer bearing his surname. In the mid-1990s he partnered with the founder of a floundering maker of cheap hard drives, Kalok, to create a new company, focused on IDE hard drives for the low end of the market. Their first idea was a 3.0" laptop hard drive form factor which never got off the ground despite some interest from Compaq. To keep costs down, JTS drives were manufactured in a facility in Madras, India with notoriously inconsistent quality control. ("There once was a drive from Madras, with two platters made out of glass. Their heads clunked together and played "Stormy Weather" and lightning shot out of its ....")
JTS noticed the high number of hard disks they produced which failed under warranty, so management decided that it was easier to raise revenue by charging a $20 fee for warranty service than trying to sell new product with their name.
This example came to me dead about ten years ago. I tried it again this week. It still tries to spin up, but makes a quiet clunking sound. The first time I tried it, my sytem locked up during IDE drive detection. This week, my main testbed system did not detect it as a JTS C1300-AF drive, but identified it with an error message instead!
I hope you enjoyed this brief history lesson. I suspect that since people pay good money for Ford Edsels and Hudson Jets, some day there may be collectors of technological debris who appreciate the likes JTS, Kalok, Orca, Tulin, LaPine, Cogito, and CMI hard drives. I am still looking for investment grade hard drives from any of these mostly forgotten manufacturers
Buyer will receive the exact drive pictured here. It will arrive dead. I am selling this to a collector of failed technological debris, AS IS, with no return privilege
I offer free USPS ground shipping to any U.S. zip code.