asd@mace.cc.purdue.edu (Kareth) (09/26/90)
In <Fz09a-a2@cs.psu.edu> melling@cs.psu.edu (Michael D Mellinger) writes: >How about Digital Audio Tape? They're about to hit the music >industry. They should drop in price after a few million DAT cassettes >of Van Halen are sold. Each tape holds about a gigabyte of data. I >would say that they will be the perfect medium for software >distribution in another year. And what's more, they are FAST! One of the computer divisions here changed a most of their backups to Exabytes, basic Sony 8mm tapes that ya can get for $5. They are nice in that you can get around 10gig using the compression routines, and 1-2gig normally. But they are SLOW!! DAT on the other hand, from what I've heard from a friend that works there (I just do backups), is that the DAT is MUCH faster as far as moving the tape, searching, etc. It definitely looks like a good way to distribute software, especially if the NeXT came with a standard DAT backup unit. Could use it to backup and put on new software. -k
philip@pescadero.Stanford.EDU (Philip Machanick) (09/26/90)
In article <5612@mace.cc.purdue.edu>, asd@mace.cc.purdue.edu (Kareth) writes: |> In <Fz09a-a2@cs.psu.edu> melling@cs.psu.edu (Michael D Mellinger) writes: |> |> >How about Digital Audio Tape? They're about to hit the music |> >industry. They should drop in price after a few million DAT cassettes |> >of Van Halen are sold. Each tape holds about a gigabyte of data. I |> >would say that they will be the perfect medium for software |> >distribution in another year. |> |> And what's more, they are FAST! One of the computer divisions here |> changed a most of their backups to Exabytes, basic Sony 8mm tapes that |> ya can get for $5. They are nice in that you can get around 10gig using |> the compression routines, and 1-2gig normally. But they are SLOW!! DAT |> on the other hand, from what I've heard from a friend that works there |> (I just do backups), is that the DAT is MUCH faster as far as moving the |> tape, searching, etc. It definitely looks like a good way to distribute |> software, especially if the NeXT came with a standard DAT backup unit. |> Could use it to backup and put on new software. |> Someone just told me Sony is about to release a read-write version of CD. This could be pretty cheap too, if it's aimed at the mass market. And you should be able to play all your music CDs on it too. (Don't ask me for more information - this is definitely all I've heard about it...) -- Philip Machanick philip@pescadero.stanford.edu
rca@cs.brown.edu (Ronald C.F. Antony) (09/29/90)
I don't think DAT's are too good a choice, they are no random access device. The convenient thing about ODs is that you need not copy the data to a disk firs when you want to access it once in a while. -- Ronald ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." Bernhard Shaw | rca@cs.brown.edu or antony@browncog.bitnet ------------------------------------------------------------------------------