http://blog.wired.com/gadgets/2008/06/five-obsolete-s.html#more
Link: 5 Obsolete Storage Formats | Gadget Lab from Wired.com.
"An average modern hard drive holds around 500 GB. The first commercial hard drive, made by IBM back in 1956, had around four and a half megabytes. The punched tape gave 4K of storage for every ten meters (32 feet). Originally used to control looms in textile factories, punched tape ended up being used to feed instructions into and out of early computers. We guess that theoretically you could encode a movie onto punched tape, but a quick reckoning using this chart tells us we would need a reel over 1,100 miles long.(...)
"That’s five already? Writing this list made me realize just how many formats have been killed by newer generations, left gathering dust as their data slowly spills into the gutters of Disk* Row.
There’s DAT, all kinds of floppies, Jaz Drives, quadrophonic LPs, wax cylinders, vacuum tubes, U-matic, Hi-8, the list is possibly endless...."
(((Okay, the list may not be entirely endless... but now try to imagine what kind of pitifully mortal data storage format you're supposed to use to
*preserve* that list for futurity. Maybe you can chisel a kilometer-long punch tape into granite.)))
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Obsolete_computer_storage_media
