History of Electronic Storage

  • Magnetic Tape

    Magnetic Tape
    Magnetic tape allows for inexpensive mass storage of information and so is a key part of the computer revolution. The IBM 726 was one of the first practical high-speed magnetic tape systems for electronic digital computers.
  • Magnetic Disk Storage

    Magnetic Disk Storage
    The IBM 350 disk file served as the storage component for the Random Access Method of Accounting and Control.
  • The 8-inch Floppy disk

    The 8-inch Floppy disk
    The 8-inch disks and drives increased over time and later versions could store up to 1.2 MB
  • 5¼-inch floppy disk

    5¼-inch floppy disk
    5¼‑inch drive (aka Mini diskette, Mini disk, or Minifloppy) is smaller than that of a 40‑track double-density (360 KB) drive but can format, read and write 40‑track disks
  • Laserdisc

    Laserdisc
    The first commercially available laserdisc system was available on the market late in 1978. The discs could have up to 60 minutes of audio/video on each side.
  • Hard Disk Drive

    Hard Disk Drive
    The first hard drive to have more than 1 GB in capacity was the IBM 3380 in 1980 (it could store 2.52 GB). It was the size of a refrigerator, weighed 550 pounds (250 kg), and the price when it was introduced ranged from $81,000 to $142,400.
  • 3½-inch Floppy disk

    3½-inch Floppy disk
    In the early 1980s, a number of manufacturers introduced smaller floppy drives and media in various formats.
  • Zip Drive

    Zip Drive
    The Zip drive is a medium-capacity removable floppy disk storage system that was introduced by Iomega in late 1994. Originally, Zip disks launched with capacities of 100 MB, but later versions increased this to first 250 MB and then 750 MB.
  • USB Flash Drives

    USB Flash Drives
    IBM's USB flash drive became available on December 15, 2000, and had a storage capacity of 8 MB, more than five times the capacity of the then-common floppy disks.
  • Cloud Storage

    Cloud storage is a model of data storage where the digital data is stored in logical pools, the physical storage spans multiple servers (and often locations), and the physical environment is typically owned and managed by a hosting company.