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With Regards Neeraj Manglik Mobile number: 9312902018 Yahoo id: [EMAIL PROTECTED] msn id: [EMAIL PROTECTED] skype id: neerajmanglik We cannot be more sensitive to pleasure without being more sensitive to pain. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Shadab Husain Syed" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[email protected]> Sent: Thursday, October 05, 2006 3:31 PM Subject: [AI] Happy birthday hard disc drive > > > happy birthday hard disc drive > > > > > > Happy birthday, hard disk drive > > John Naughton > > THE HARD disk is 50 years old this month. On September 13, 1956, IBM > unveiled its IBM 305 Ramac computer, whose major selling point was that it > had something called a "disk drive": the 350 Disk File unit. Up to then, > data had been stored either on magnetic drums or on tape, either of which > made accessing files a painfully slow process. > > The 350 Disk File offered a blessed release from this torment. It consisted > of a rack of 50 24-inch, magnetically coated platters mounted on a single > vertical spindle and rotating at high speed. In between the platters, and > looking rather like a giant animated hair-comb, was an assembly of > read-write heads that clacked in and out, reading or writing data from and > to the disks and passing the information to and from the machine's > processor. > > The drive was the size of two large refrigerators, and was leased to > customers at an annual rental of $35,000, which, according to my > calculations, would be about $250,000 in today's money. > > But corporate customers thought it a bargain because it meant that their > (very expensive) mainframe computers were suddenly more versatile as well as > faster. > > A digital computer works by taking data from a permanent storage medium, > carrying out operations on that data, and then writing the results back into > storage. > > The slowest part of this process was getting stuff out of, and into, > storage, and hard disks offered a way of easing the bottleneck. The result: > more data, processed faster. > > IBM's colossal spinning plate-rack held a grand total of 4.4 megabytes of > data, which is not quite enough space to store the copy of Eric Clapton's > Lonely Stranger that I carry around on my iPod. The hard disk in the iPod is > just 1.8 inches in diameter, and yet it can store 60 gigabytes of data, > which is almost 14,000 times the capacity of the 350 Disk File. The drive in > my laptop is 2.5 inches in diameter and has a capacity of 120 gigabytes. > Next year's model will doubtless hold 200 gigabytes. And so it goes on. > > At one level, the story of the hard disk industry is a metaphor for the > development of the entire computer industry: double the performance for half > the price with every passing year. > > Fascinating though it is in business terms, the breakneck evolution of hard > drive technology is actually the least interesting part of the story. Far > more significant is what that technology has made possible. It has > effectively reduced the cost of storing data so close to zero as to make no > difference. That is why Google can offer two gigabytes of free personal data > storage to anyone who signs up for Gmail. Without cheap and boundless mass > storage, companies such as Google, Amazon, and eBay couldn't exist, and > services such as Apple's iTunes, Wikipedia, and the Internet Archive would > be unthinkable. > > As with all technologies, there is a darker side to the storage revolution > triggered by IBM in 1956. For example, it is what enables the National > Security Agency, if it chooses to do so, to store on its servers a copy of > every email ever dispatched by a U.S. citizen. It enables phone companies to > store detailed records of every phone call you make in your lifetime, and > turns national DNA and ID-card databases into feasible propositions. > > No matter how one views the impact of hard disk technology, one thing is > unarguable: it's been given a raw deal by history. The story of computing > has hitherto been told almost entirely in terms of advances in processors > and networks. But the truth is that nothing that we take for granted today > would be possible without the vast, fast, cheap mass storage provided by > hard disks. - C Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006 > > > > > > > > > > Shadab Husain Mo: 9335206224 > > > > To unsubscribe send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the subject unsubscribe. > > To change your subscription to digest mode or make any other changes, please visit the list home page at > http://accessindia.org.in/mailman/listinfo/accessindia_accessindia.org.in > To unsubscribe send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the subject unsubscribe. To change your subscription to digest mode or make any other changes, please visit the list home page at http://accessindia.org.in/mailman/listinfo/accessindia_accessindia.org.in
