DMC-FX7
ƒ/2.8
5.8 mm
1/10
200

…reflected in the cabinetry of the world’s first disk drive, the 1956 RAMAC prototype, on its 50-year anniversary.

The size of a large refrigerator.
5 Megabytes on fifty 24” disks.
2KBits/sq. inch areal density; 20 tracks/inch; 100 bits/inch
8.8 kbits/second transfer rate.

The disk drive has improved more dramatically than the semiconductor (reflected in Moore’s law). Disk drive areal storage density has improved over 35 million times since 1956. (IBM Paper with long term graphs)

6 responses to “IBM Almaden”

  1. mixed ink Avatar
    mixed ink

    And it could be more than more if one day we could work with photon particles, abandoning the so slow and fat electron. what about the crystal memory and light processing ability ?
    I love the way the engineers were building this prototype. it is simply beautiful, amazing, a master piece of art of macro electro-mechanics industrial era 8)

    Reply
  2. pfflyerpf Avatar
    pfflyerpf

    i love this evolution of man. i am so pleased you can picture these technical masterpieces. thanks

    Reply
  3. Todd Huffman Avatar
    Todd Huffman

    Steve – Have you seen the "Memories" exhibit in the Gates building at Stanford? They have some fantastic olde schoole memory equipment. The second floor has some great stuff www-db.stanford.edu/pub/voy/museum/pictures/display/2-1.htm

    THe Acoustic Delay Line Memory is such an interesting concept, and it was neat to see one there…

    Check out the wikipedia article en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercury_delay_line

    Reply
  4. TroyWorks Avatar
    TroyWorks

    i so wanted to see the Cray’s cooling working.

    Reply
  5. mic888 Avatar
    mic888

    that’s a great historical piece of equipment. 5 MB… Amazing.

    Reply
  6. jurvetson Avatar
    jurvetson

    oddwick: cool, I’ll have not gone to the 2nd floor of Gates yet…. Gotta check that out.

    TroyWorks: here are some of Cray’s pipes:
    Personable Computer

    And here’s one of the graphs from the IBM paper:

    Reply

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