Hamdard University

Dep. Of Computing

Name: M. Nafees

BS(CS)-I

Introduction to computing

Magnetic Tape:

Magnetic tape is a medium for magnetic recording, made of a thin magnetize able coating on a
device that stores computer data on magnetic tape is a tape drive (tape unit, streamer).
Magnetic tape revolutionized broadcast and recording.

Magnetic tape revolutionized broadcast and recording. When all radio was live, it allowed
programming to be recorded. At a time whengramophone records were recorded in one
take, it allowed recordings to be made in multiple parts, which were then mixed and edited
with tolerable loss in quality. It is a key technology in early computer development, allowing
unparalleled amounts of data to be mechanically created, stored for long periods, and to be
rapidly accessed.

Nowadays other technologies can perform the functions of magnetic tape. In many cases
these technologies are replacing tape. Despite this, innovation in the technology
continues, Sony and IBM continue to produce new magnetic tape drives.[1]

Over years, magnetic tape can suffer from deterioration called sticky-shed syndrome.
Caused by absorption of moisture into the binder of the tape, it can render the tape
unusable.

Construction[edit]
The oxide side of a tape is the surface that can be magnetically manipulated by a tape
head. This is the side that stores the information, the opposite side is simply a substrate to
hold the tape together. The name originates from the fact that the magnetic side of most
tapes is made of an oxide of iron. Sometimes chromium is also used.

Data storage[edit]
Main article: Magnetic tape data storage

In all tape formats, a tape drive (or "transport" or "deck") uses motors to wind the tape from
one reel to another, passing tape heads to read, write or erase as it moves.

Magnetic tape was first used to record computer data in 1951 on the Eckert-
Mauchly UNIVAC I. The recording medium was a thin strip of one half inch (12.65 mm) wide
metal, consisting of nickel-plated bronze (called Vicalloy). Recording density was 128
characters per inch (198 micrometre/character) on eight tracks.

Small open reel of 9 track tape

Early IBM tape drives were floor-standing drives that used vacuum columns to physically
buffer long U-shaped loops of tape. The two tape reels visibly fed tape through the columns,
intermittently spinning the reels in rapid, unsynchronized bursts, resulting in visually striking
action. Stock shots of such vacuum-column tape drives in motion were widely used to
represent "the computer" in movies and television.

Quarter inch cartridges, a data format commonly used in the 1980s and 1990s.

Most modern magnetic tape systems use reels that are much smaller than the 10.5 inch
open reels and are fixed inside a cartridge to protect the tape and facilitate handling. Many
late 1970s and early 1980s home computers used Compact Cassettes, encoded with
the Kansas City standard, or several other "standards" such as the Tarbell Cassette
Interface. Modern cartridge formats include LTO, DLT, and DAT/DDC.

Tape remains a viable alternative to disk in some situations due to its lower cost per bit.
This is a large advantage when dealing with large amounts of data. Though the areal
density of tape is lower than for disk drives, the available surface area on a tape is far
greater. The highest capacity tape media are generally on the same order as the largest
available disk drives (about 5 TB in 2011). Tape has historically offered enough advantage
in cost over disk storage to make it a viable product, particularly for backup, where media
removability is necessary.

Tape has the benefit of a comparatively long duration during which the media can be
guaranteed to retain the data stored on the media. Fifteen (15) to thirty (30) years of
archival data storage is cited by manufacturers of modern data tape such as Linear Tape-
Open media.

In 2002, Imation received a US$11.9 million grant from the U.S. National Institute of
Standards and Technology for research into increasing the data capacity of magnetic tape.[3]

In 2014 Sony and IBM announced that they had been able to record 148 gigabits per
square inch with magnetic tape media developed using a new vacuum thin-film forming
technology able to form extremely fine crystal particles, allowing true tape capacity of 185
TB.[

Magnetic Disk
Magnetic storage or magnetic recording is the storage of data on a magnetised medium.
Magnetic storage uses different patterns of magnetisation in a magnetisable material to
store data and is a form of non-volatile memory. The information is accessed using one or
more read/write heads.

As of 2013, magnetic storage media, primarily hard disks, are widely used to
store computer data as well as audio and videosignals. In the field of computing, the
term magnetic storage is preferred and in the field of audio and video production, the
term magnetic recording is more commonly used. The distinction is less technical and more
a matter of preference. Other examples of magnetic storage media include floppy disks,
magnetic recording tape, and magnetic stripes on credit cards.

Design[edit]
Hard drives use magnetic memory to store giga- and terabytes of data in computers.

Information is written to and read from the storage medium as it moves past devices
called read-and-write heads that operate very close (often tens of nanometers) over the
magnetic surface. The read-and-write head is used to detect and modify the magnetisation
of the material immediately under it. There are two magnetic polarities, each of which is
used to represent either 0 or 1.

The magnetic surface is conceptually divided into many small sub-micrometer-sized

magnetic regions, referred to as magnetic domains, (although these are not magnetic
domains in a rigorous physical sense), each of which has a mostly uniform magnetisation.
Due to thepolycrystalline nature of the magnetic material each of these magnetic regions is
composed of a few hundred magnetic grains. Magnetic grains are typically 10 nm in size
and each form a single true magnetic domain. Each magnetic region in total forms
a magnetic dipolewhich generates a magnetic field. In older hard disk drive (HDD) designs
the regions were oriented horizontally and parallel to the disk surface, but beginning about
2005, the orientation was changed to perpendicular to allow for closer magnetic domain
spacing.

For reliable storage of data, the recording material needs to resist self-demagnetisation,
which occurs when the magnetic domains repel each other. Magnetic domains written too
densely together to a weakly magnetisable material will degrade over time due to rotation of
themagnetic moment one or more domains to cancel out these forces. The domains rotate
sideways to a halfway position that weakens the readability of the domain and relieves the
magnetic stresses. Older hard disk drives used iron(III) oxide as the magnetic material, but
current disks use a cobalt-based alloy.[1]

A write head magnetises a region by generating a strong local magnetic field, and a read
head detects the magnetisation of the regions. Early HDDs used an electromagnet both to
magnetise the region and to then read its magnetic field by using electromagnetic induction.
Later versions of inductive heads included Metal In Gap (MIG) heads and thin filmheads. As
data density increased, read heads using magnetoresistance (MR) came into use; the
electrical resistance of the head changed according to the strength of the magnetism from
the platter. Later development made use of spintronics; in read heads, the magnetoresistive
effect was much greater than in earlier types, and was dubbed"giant"
magnetoresistance (GMR). In today's heads, the read and write elements are separate, but
in close proximity, on the head portion of an actuator arm. The read element is
typically magneto-resistive while the write element is typically thin-film inductive.[2]

The heads are kept from contacting the platter surface by the air that is extremely close to
the platter; that air moves at or near the platter speed. The record and playback head are
mounted on a block called a slider, and the surface next to the platter is shaped to keep it
just barely out of contact. This forms a type of air bearing.

Magnetic recording classes[edit]

Analog recording[edit]
Main article: Magnetic tape sound recording

Analog recording is based on the fact that remnant magnetisation of a given material
depends on the magnitude of the applied field. The magnetic material is normally in the
form of tape, with the tape in its blank form being initially demagnetised. When recording,
the tape runs at a constant speed. The writing head magnetises the tape with current
proportional to the signal. A magnetisation distribution is achieved along the magnetic tape.
Finally, the distribution of the magnetisation can be read out, reproducing the original signal.
The magnetic tape is typically made by embedding magnetic particles in a plastic binder on
polyester film tape. The commonly used magnetic particles are Iron oxide particles or
Chromium oxide and metal particles with size of 0.5 micrometers.[3] Analog recording was
the most popular method of audio and video recording. In the past 20 years, however, tape
recording has declined in popularity due to digital recording.[4]
Digital recording[edit]
Instead of creating a magnetisation distribution in analog recording, digital recording only
needs two stable magnetic states, which are the +Ms and -Ms on the hysteresis loop.
Examples of digital recording are floppy disks and hard disk drives (HDDs). Digital recording
has also been carried out on tapes. However, HDDs offer superior capacities at reasonable
prices; at the time of writing (2014), consumer-grade HDDs offer data storage at about
3 GB/$.

Recording media on HDDs use a stack of thin films to store information and a read/write
head to read and write information to and from the media; various developments have been
carried out in the area of used materials.[5]
Magneto-optical recording[edit]
Magneto-optical recording writes/reads optically. When writing, the magnetic medium is
heated locally by a laser, which induces a rapid decrease of coercive field. Then, a small
magnetic field can be used to switch the magnetisation. The reading process is based on
magneto-optical Kerr effect. The magnetic medium are typically amorphous R-FeCo thin
film (R being a rare earth element). Magneto-optical recording is not very popular. One
famous example is Minidisc developed by Sony.
Domain propagation memory
Domain propagation memory is also called bubble memory. The basic idea is to control
domain wall motion in a magnetic medium that is free of microstructure. Bubble refers to a
stable cylindrical domain. Data is then recorded by the presence/absence of a bubble
domain. Domain propagation memory has high insensitivity to shock and vibration, so its
application is usually in space and aeronautics.