Hi Roy.

04-Oct-03 04:06:02, Roy J. Tellason wrote to Jasen Betts


 JB>> I've still got a couple of working 5.25" floppy drives...  but I
 JB>> don't think I'll still have them in 10 years time.

 RJT> 360k or 1.2M?  :-)  I have both here,  as well as a pair of 8"
 RJT> drives,  and a spare pair,  just in case..

 JB>> DVD drives can read CDs but after DVDs are obsolete there's a
 JB>> good chance media will change shape.

 RJT> Change shape?  To what?

  something pocket sized probably.

that seems to be the way with most media,

 RJT> I've often thought it odd that we have round optical media that
 RJT> spin,  and have to get moved past a (relatively) stationary head.
 RJT>  Years ago I wanted to take a small CRT and move 35mm film in
 RJT> front of it,  scanning a single line for writing and a whole
 RJT> frame for reading back the developed film.

 I thought of something similar, but with 8mm film instead, :)
 userd 8mm equipment ca be had for a few bucks, dunno if media is still
 available.

but I'm not sure that film lasts longer than CDs...

 Would've been one
 RJT> heck of an interesting experiment in fabrication (stepper motor
 RJT> drive,  light-tight box,  etc.) but the fact that I'd need to
 RJT> handle film like that,  get it developed,  and then figure out a
 RJT> way to handle the resulting processed negative pushed it just
 RJT> beyond the point where I wanted to make the attempt at it (though
 RJT> I still do have a couple of 3" CRTs in storage :-)

I've gota 1" one here (part of an old video camera)

 RJT> Maybe an LCD panel would work?

maybe just a row of LEDs? or even a scanning laser.

-- another idea was a paper backup - encode data in bit-patterns using a laser
printer, but at 600 DPI you can get about 1 meg/page

 RJT> I wonder what sort of resolution you could get with binary data
 RJT> on fine-grained B&W film

it'd be better than TV .... maybe 100 bits per milimetre-
hmmm that's only 2540 dpi... maybe much more.

 RJT> I'll bet scanning a strip would be able to be done *much* faster
 RJT> than spinning a disc of any sort..

 with any strip-media seek times would be the killer.

 -=> Bye <=-

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