Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!tank!mimsy!haven!ames!joyce!sri-unix!garth!phipps
From: phipps@garth.UUCP (Clay Phipps)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Bubbles (was Re: Solid State Secondary Storage)
Message-ID: <2409@garth.UUCP>
Date: 14 Jan 89 09:02:35 GMT
References: <248@vlsi.ll.mit.edu>
Reply-To: phipps@garth.UUCP (Clay Phipps)
Distribution: comp
Organization: INTERGRAPH (APD) -- Palo Alto, CA
Lines: 34

In article <248@vlsi.ll.mit.edu> young@vlsi.ll.mit.edu (George Young) writes:
>...a new kind of computer memory unit -- 
>something we hope might fill in the present gap in memory speed and price 
>between magnetic disk and ram.
>...resulting in access time of maybe ~10 microseconds.  
>So we are left with a box that is:
>	capacity of a few hundred megabytes,
>	word addressable,
>	much faster access than disk,
>	much slower than ram,
>	and around the same price as disk.
>It also should be smaller, lighter, and more rugged than disk.

Sounds to me like a lot of what bubble memory was expected 
in the late 1970s to be able to be used for.  

Bubble memory is nonvolatile.
I was convinced then that by now, computer users would be carrying 
around bubble-memory cartridges encased in epoxy (or the like)
the way people now carry floppy disks around.

The price may not have been right at the time, but 
technology advances were expected to take care of that.  
The major concern, as I recall, was that in the late 1970s,
the error rate for bubbles was decimal orders of magnitude 
worse than disks.  And disks kept getting better and better.

What ever happened to bubble memory, anyhow ?

-- 
[The foregoing may or may not represent the position, if any, of my employer]
 
Clay Phipps                       {ingr,pyramid,sri-unix!hplabs}!garth!phipps
Intergraph APD, 2400#4 Geng Road, Palo Alto, CA 93403            415/494-8800