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The IBM Punched Card

From the beginning of tabulation, stiff rectangular cards punched with holes became the way data was recorded and stored.

As IBM grew to dominate data processing by the 1920s, its cards—which only worked on IBM machines and vice-versa—became the global industry standard.

In 1928, IBM improved on the cards’ design so more data could be stored on a single card.

From the 1950s through about 1970, IBM punched cards were the primary way corporations and governments stored and accessed information, making the cards the most durable, successful data storage medium since the book.

RAMAC

The First Magnetic Hard Disk

The world’s first hard disk drive was the size of two kitchen refrigerators set side by side.

It contained 24 disks spinning at 1,200 revolutions per minute, supplying data at 100,000 bits per second.

It was the IBM RAMAC (Random Access Method of Accounting and Control), and it allowed enterprises to think about data in new ways—mixing and matching it on the fly, allowing each bit of information to be read or changed randomly.

Along with IBM’s magnetic tape drive, the 1956 release of RAMAC essentially launched the data storage industry.