Stan Barr wrote:
On Tue, 12 Jun 2007 10:32:49 -0700, Tim Shoppa
wrote:
What's the bulkiest removable storage media? Drums etc. don't count
because you don't often switch the drum (although they certainly could
be heavy judging by nothing but the size of the bearings). I worked
with RP06 packs and some funky optical tape reels in the past, but
those were pretty measly compared to some others I have seen or heard
about:
..
An IMAX 3-D reel can be 350 pounds and even the projector room even
has a dedicated forklift for helping load them:
http://www.architectureweek.com/2002...lding_1-2.html
..
An SSEC "paper tape" reel was punched-card-width stock not cut into
individual cards, sprocket holed and with 78 usable columns, and a
reel of it weighed 400 pounds:
http://www.columbia.edu/acis/history/ssec-tape.html
..
Any other bulkier examples I'm missing?
..
The original BBC steel tape video recorders? Huge reels of thin steel
tape, spliced by welding and grinding!
..
An IMAX reel is, of course, a film reel. And the SSEC paper tape
wasn't intended to be removed except to be discarded when used up - it
was the memory of that one computer.

Still, these examples certainly have anything I might suggest beat - I
was thinking of the tape reels of the Datamatic D-1000 computer, which
were *pretty* bulky, but not in this league.

http://www.smecc.org/honeywell_datamatic_1000.htm

31-channel magnetic tape, 3 inches wide.

John Savard