Hi Bit Tech Universe, I am working on constructing a kind of evolution of man style display on the development of digital storage i.e. magnetic tape, floppy discs etc. I after a lot of research ended up with a rather long list of the various modes of storage that have gone into (and out of) vogue and was wondering what everyone else would rank as the top ten key evolutions of digital storage.
Don't think I'll get to ten really: What to start with... punch cards? Was there anything before? Then tapes of various sizes. Then magnetic disks of various sizes. Then optical disks, probably of various sizes. Then non-volatile memory in various shapes. That's it really. I think every storage I know falls within these categories. Yeah? But " the Cloud"??? I hear you. What is data in "the cloud" actually saved upon? Harddisks somewhere, heck I wouldn't be surprised if datacentres STILL use tape in some form. Oh, I remembered some more. Holographic, or better said 3D-optical storage Opto-Magnetic (well this fals under optical disks really) Core Memory (falls under non-volatile, but with different physics) Delay line memory So only Holographic and delay-line are new, delay line is analogue if I understand it correctly (and VERY volatile)
They do, however only for backups and you'd be shocked how many of them are stored in hollowed out mountains. (often in Switzerland, as the military there put a lot of effort into building bunkers in mountains, then some of them where abandoned when the World Wars and Cold War ended, so they are now used for storage). Shark Tank and Lava Pit presumed optional
I don't think so, but punch cards predate computers by about 150 years - the Jacquard Loom, invented in the early 1800s, used punch cards to weave patterned fabrics. I think Xir has pretty much covered the evolution. You might want to explore the idea data density as well as the technology - capacities have got bigger, devices have got smaller, prices have dropped (I remember working with Sun Microsystems about 15 years ago, and I think they were selling 1Tb of storage at around £20-30k. Storage now costs about £30/Tb, which is a massive drop in quite a short time).
This is a good idea, there is a lot of rich history in this. The discovery of GMR alone launched hard drive capacity to the heights we see today.
I think Xir missed the most important method and that is stone either in the form of cave paintings or stone tablets.
Well he did ask about DIGITAL storage.... So I left out the hyroglyphs and stuff I don't know, sometimes, while I wait for the gate at work to identify my credentials, it takes so long, I'm sure there's someone in....Munich fast forwarding the tape to X as Xir I renovated a house last year and my wife wouldn't let me install these items... Mind you I almost got her to allow me a secret trap door under the entrance mat.
