Cassette Tape Makes a Comeback

[Rickster71]

Researchers at Fuji Film in Japan and IBM in Zurich, Switzerland, have already built prototypes that can store 35 terabytes of data - or about 35 million books' worth of information - on a cartridge that measures just 10 centimetres by 10 cm by 2 cm.
Cassette tapes are the future of big data storage - tech - 19 October 2012 - New Scientist

 

[markw]

For mass storage such as backup/restore functions this makes a lot of sense. But I can just imagine the mechanics and electronics involved in the fast forward/rewinding needed for random access to find that one particular song hidden somewhere in those millions of songs stored sequentially on the tape, not to mention the physical stress on the tape itself.

 

[Rickster71]

I remember my old CAD workstation with Windows-NT had a tape storage.
12Gb was pretty good, better than DVD's.
It was meant for backups and archiving.
The article sounds like it just used the music and book as examples to show off the capacity.
They're saying tapes used less power than a constantly spinning disk drive.
Pretty cool, what's old is new again.

 

[markw]

I remember playing with TRS-80 Model 1's and using an "official" Radio Shack tape recorder made specifically for that purpose. Hint: it was a regular portable cassette machine with fancy black external.

Can you say "CLOAD", kiddies?

OK, so we're both old. I guess the secret's out now...

 

[Rickster71]

The tapes I used looked more like small camcorder tapes.
I missed the whole TRS-80 thing.

 

[markw]

The tapes I used looked more like small camcorder tapes.
I missed the whole TRS-80 thing.

Don't try to weasel your way out of it. old man. You're a dinosaur, too.

Next I'll bet you try to deny working with 5 1/4" floppys.

 

[j_garcia]

Their next project

 

[darien87]

I remember when we figured out that you could buy a single sided 5-1/4" floppy disk and use a hole punch to punch a hole in the side and turn it into a double sided disk. We thought we were genius'.

 

[j_garcia]

I still had some 5 1/4 discs around some years back, but no drives to use them in LOL.

I still have a 40 MEGABYTE 3.5" hard disc Tossed the computer, but kept that for posterity.

 

[slipperybidness]

I remember playing with TRS-80 Model 1's and using an "official" Radio Shack tape recorder made specifically for that purpose. Hint: it was a regular portable cassette machine with fancy black external.

Can you say "CLOAD", kiddies?

OK, so we're both old. I guess the secret's out now...

Yup, I remember our first computer was the TRS-80, then the TRS-81 after that. Yup, the old tape recorder as a drive. C:load xxx, then hit the play button And we had a subscrition, I think it was called Rainbow Magazine. Every month they would send a cassette tape full of programs with the mag that had more programs that you could type in yourself.

I still use some old DOS computers at work.

Also, cassettes as backups/archives never really went away. Our server at my old job about 7 years ago had the tape backup system.

 

[markw]

Anybody else remember the great CP/M vs TRSDOS (and GWBasic) wars?

That lasted pretty much until IBM came out with their PC and the 800 pound gorilla stomped on everyone.

How about Visicalc?

 

[MR.MAGOO]

http://www-03.ibm.com/systems/storage/tape/ts3500/

2.25 exabytes.....

 

[herbu]

That lasted pretty much until IBM came out with their PC

I was there and intimately involved. It was the coolest thing ever! Every advancement was amazing... 8086 > 80286 uproc... 10Mb HDD... etc. It was a fascinating time and I was lucky to be involved in it.

 

[MR.MAGOO]

Has anyone tried that device 'Cassette to CD' convertor? $60, ad found here on Audioholics. I dusted off the old Advent 201, seems okay, will try that first.