Video of ceramic storage system prototype surfaces online — 10,000TB cartridges bombarded with laser rays could become mainstream by 2030, making slow hard drives and tapes obsolete
www.techradar.com
Ceramics-based storage medium consumes very little energy and lasts more than 5,000 years, creators say

Those totally look like the isolinear chips from Star Trek

  • voodooattack@lemmy.world
    82·
    11 months ago

    Data is written by two million laser beamlets that punch QR code-like nano-scale patterns into the surface of the media. The laser pulse is sharpened by a digital micromirror device, and shaped by microscope optics onto the surface of the data carrier. This process imprints holes – or no holes – onto the surface layer, which represents binary information.

    It’s futuristic punchcards. We’ve come full circle.

    • jaidyn999@lemm.ee
      1·
      11 months ago

      A punchcard is two dimensional. Actually you can have multiple dimensions on a punch card, the positions of the card can store different data and you can determine what that is by the position of holes on another part of the card.

      Whereas a paper tape, or a magnetic tape is serial and has only one dimension (you can divide the tape into different bands though).

  • Seasm0ke@lemmy.world
    22·
    11 months ago

    So am I wrong to say this is a stone tablet hard drive? Doesn’t seem like you can overwrite data on it

    • EatYouWell@lemmy.world
      13·
      11 months ago

      You don’t need to. These are intended for backups and data archiving where storage density matters the most

      • Seasm0ke@lemmy.world
        4·
        11 months ago

        Seems like thered be some extra hoops to get through for differential backups, impossible to us for most daily applications, probably better suited for things like laboratory and archives…

      • Evil_Shrubbery@lemm.ee
        1·
        11 months ago

        CD-ROMs are read-only(-memory) & usually stamped plastic covered with mirror-ish surface (aluminum-somethings prob?).

        CD-R have an (recordable) organic layer on top you can burn lil patterns into, once only.

        CD-RW can be re-written several times.

        But none of them really last long.

        • ChaoticNeutralCzech@feddit.de
          1·
          11 months ago

          Many pressed CD-ROMs and audio CDs will likely last over 100 years if stored properly. However, the tolerances in the standard are high so lots of manufacturers use cheaper materials and processes than intended while still producing discs with the CD logo. It will take decades before we really know which were worse than others. The most likely point of failure is delamination, which will leak air between the layers and oxidize the aluminum coating in a process named laser rot after Laserdiscs, the earliest commercial optical disc system.

          Anyway, the longetivity of (re)writable CDs is indeed usually below 20 years.

          • Evil_Shrubbery@lemm.ee
            1·
            11 months ago

            Yes, storage is very important in the long run.

            And music industry indeed had some of the thiccest disks afaik.

            • ChaoticNeutralCzech@feddit.de
              1·
              11 months ago

              No, it’s not about the thickness. Most of it is clear plastic anyway, the data layer is only in the top few dozen micrometers. Also, all CDs and later 12cm discs were 1 mm thick by spec.

              • Evil_Shrubbery@lemm.ee
                1·
                11 months ago

                Yes, I am talking about the top layer - some are def thiccer and more scratch resistant (I didn’t mean thicket like you would notice looking at it from the side).

          • IONLYpost@kbin.social
            1·
            8 months ago

            The recording layers of the CDDAs (1983-1987) had already vanished. So they lasted no longer than 40 years.
            "SHM-CD"s would probably meet that 100 year mark but DVDs made them pointless by the time they were first released.

  • A_A@lemmy.world
    14·
    11 months ago

    … Data can be written at GBps speeds, with TB/square-centimeter areal densities …

    Say, 8 Tbits/cm² (so 1 TB/cm²) …
    this is aprox ( 10-7m )2 unit cells.

    Conventional optical microscopy cannot resolve this, so, maybe they are using evanescent surface optics ?

  • JohnWorks@sh.itjust.works
    9·
    11 months ago

    Based on the demo video I’m assuming this is more for archival storage rather than on demand. So more like a tape replacement rather than hard drive?

  • mindbleach@sh.itjust.works
    3·
    11 months ago

    Storage tech isn’t as sensationalized and vapor-heavy as battery tech, but I do still wish holographic versatile discs had been a thing.