Magnetic tape

Magnetic tape is a flexible strip coated with magnetic material that stores sound, video, or digital data as magnetically encoded patterns.

Magnetic recording: A method of storing information by magnetizing a medium in patterns that can later be sensed. Tape records signals by writing changing magnetic patterns along its moving surface.
Magnetic domain: A region in a magnetic material whose atomic magnetic moments are aligned in a common direction. Recorded patterns alter the alignment of domains within the tape's coating.
Audio tape: Magnetic tape designed to record and reproduce sound. Audio tape applies the medium to music, speech, and other sound recordings.
Hard disk drive: A data-storage device that records information magnetically on rotating rigid disks. Unlike tape's sequential access, disk heads can seek directly to data locations.
Valdemar Poulsen: A Danish engineer who invented the Telegraphone, an early magnetic sound recorder using steel wire. Poulsen's wire recorder established magnetic sound recording before tape was developed.
Magnetic head: A transducer that writes, reads, or erases magnetic patterns on a recording medium. The head converts electrical signals to magnetic changes and senses them during playback.
Magnetic particle: A small grain of magnetic material that can retain magnetization. Particles in the coating provide the microscopic storage sites for tape recordings.
Videotape: Magnetic tape used to record and reproduce television or other video signals. Videotape uses specialized recording patterns to store the much wider bandwidth of video.
Solid-state drive: A data-storage device that uses flash memory and has no moving parts. Flash access is faster and more direct, while tape excels at inexpensive archival capacity.
Telegraphone: An early magnetic sound recorder patented by Valdemar Poulsen in 1898. Its steel-wire medium supplied a direct precedent for magnetic tape recording.

Linked from 9 pages