13 Jul
2026
13 Jul
'26
7:06 a.m.
On 7/13/26 02:29, Christian Corti via cctalk wrote:
On Thu, 9 Jul 2026, Michael Thompson wrote:
And Burroughs, too. They also built large fixed-head disk
drives for OEMs (e.g. Telefunken TSP 500)
Years ago I traded some stuff and got a HUGE fixed-head disk
(I think made by VTC) that had a 3 foot diameter single
platter that ran at 1200 RPM. It had banks of 8 heads on
large ceramic sliders and the disk was on a linear bearing
so that flyweights could load the platter onto the heads
when up to speed. Some experimenting with it (I had ZERO
docs with it) indicated I would have some difficulty getting
more than about a megabyte on it. I forget whether it had
32 or 64 tracks. The max capacity was 256 tracks.
It was used with an accounting/billing system that looked
like a desktop calculator made by Mohawk Data Sciences. I
think it was called a mem-O-ree. This thing was all
wire-wrapped and pre-computer.
Jon
On Jul 9,
2026, at 4:06?AM, Mark Linimon via cctalk
<cctalk(a)classiccmp.org> wrote:
There were a number of manufacturers early on. Rice
University
may have had a Bryant (sp?) drive at one time. When I
arrived
in 1973 there was a spare platter collecting dust in a
storage
area.
Bryant made early drives for CDC, the 6603 if I remember
right. Those have quite large platters.