SALMIYA INDIAN MODEL SCHOOL, KUWAIT

Subject: ICT Date: 18.9.2022

Class: IX IG

Magnetic tapes: They are very thin strip of plastic coated with magnetic layer.
They are read and written by read/write head. The data is stored in magnetic areas
that represent 1 or 0. Data is read from the tape using serial access. It is useless for
real life and online applications and used in offline or batch processing.
Uses:
1. Used in batch processing applications and speed of data access or specific
processing order is not essential.
2. Used as backup media.
3. Used in long term archiving of data.

Adv:
1. They are less expensive than hard disk.
2. It is very robust technology.
3. They have a huge data storage capacity.
4. The data transfer rate is usually fast.

Dis Adv:
1. Very slow data access time.
2. When updating, another tape is needed to store the final updated version.
3. They are affected by magnetic fields, a strong magnet can corrupt the data
stored on the tape.

Optical storage media:

1. CD/DVD disks: A red laser light is used to read data and write data on the
surface of the disk. Both CDs and DVDs use a thin layer of metal alloy or
light sensitive organic dye to store the data. They use a single spiral track
that runs from the center of the disk to the edge. The data is stored in the pits
and bumps on the spiral track. CDs use single 1.2nm polycarbonate layer
and track pitch is 1.60 µm.
They are of 3 types
a. R- write once only
b. ROM – can only be read
c. RW – can be written to or read from many times.

The main difference between DVD and CD is the dual – layering which
increases the storage capacity. There are 2 individual recording layers which
are joined with the transparent spacer also with a very thin reflector. Reading
and writing of the second layer is done by red laser focusing at a fraction of
millimeter difference compared to the first layer.
Standard single layer DVD still have larger storage capacity than the CDs
because pit size and track width are both smaller. DVDs use lasers of
wavelength 650 nanometers and CDs use 780 nanometers. The shorter the
wavelength of laser light greater the storage capacity.