my concept of splitting the data and the formatting information relies on the data blocks being the correct size for whatever media you are creating. In other words, you could see 128, 256, 512, and 1024 "sectors" for floppies. Each data block is assigned a number (virtual or real) that is then used to put the data in the correct physical location on whatever media it was supposed to be put in. The addressing of the hex formats in less important that the ability to have a block size of the required length. A paper tape data block would be whatever arbitrary length the tape was a be sequential. Same goes for a cassette tapel recording that might have been converted to mp3 for storage. best regards, Steve Thatcher -----Original Message----- From: "David V. Corbin" <dvcorbin(a)optonline.net> Sent: Aug 11, 2004 8:46 AM To: "'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts'" <cctalk(a)classiccmp.org> Subject: RE: Let's develop an open-source media archive standard S1 = 16 bit address in each record.. S2 = 24 bit address in each record.. S3 = 32 bit address in each record.. Hence the maximum sizes.....