I'm spending a couple of hours today retiring the few backups I still have on ZIP (250 MB) and moving them over to CD-R. ZIP is just too slow for large amounts of data (at least compared to 48X CD drives) and keeping two separate mediums (CD and ZIPs) is too much of a pain. Plus, CD-R is simply too inexpensive these days to justify ZIPs (can't say I've tried the new 750 MB ZIPs, but I'm not inclined to either). I'm disconnecting the drive (which I haven't used in the last 3 months) and leaving it there for one of those just-in-case situations. After all, it is light and easy to carry around... so it's useful when making backups on the road (unless your notebook has a built-in CD-R that is--mine doesn't).

It was good while it lasted, ZIP was a great technology in its early days, and it certainly had a good 3-4 year run, considering how fast things move in storage technologies. Now to wait for the day when DVD-Rs replace CD-Rs...