Line #35 Main/ComputerEqualsTapedrive


1	[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/chm_ibm_2401_tape_drives_7659.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:300:[[ItBelongsInAMuseum That belongs]] in a [[http://www.computerhistory.org/ museum!]]]]
3
4	->''"Whoa, whoa, what's this? Are you kidding me? Are we using tape reel computers? Noooo! Wait... are those slots for punched cards?"''
5	-->-- '''[[https://youtu.be/kGGQ1wvMDr8?t=4m47s Gordon Freeman,]]''' ''WebVideo/FreemansMind''
6
7	In older movies and TV shows, made before the invention of the personal computer, all computers had large nine-track reel-to-reel magnetic tape drives, which were always moving back and forth. They usually had banks of blinking lights as well. Most viewers were left with the impression that the tape drive ''was'' the computer.
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9	This was primarily done because the computer itself is very visually uninteresting when in operation. [[RuleOfPerception When a Tape Drive is operating, there is obviously something going on]] - just look at the [[WhenThingsSpinScienceHappens spinning reels!]] (This was also, it must be remembered, the era before ''monitors'' and graphical user interfaces were common, so computational results generally had to come from a printout.)
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11	No longer as common, since in RealLife, almost everybody[[note]]except certain industrial class backup systems[[/note]] has stopped using the old-fashioned 9-track mag tape reel because of size and cost. A 6250 bpi, 1600 foot tape could hold, at most, a little over 100 megabytes of data,[[note]]the normal maximum block size is 32760 bytes, and each 32760-byte block takes, with the gap following it, 5.992 inches[[/note]] and costs about US$12. By 2012, it was possible to walk into a stationery store and buy a microSD card the size of a man's thumbnail for close to $12, and it would hold at least 4 billion bytes, or about 50 times as much as the above tape reel. And that's not even the cheapest example. A top-of-the-line 4 terabyte[[note]]that's 4 ''trillion'' bytes[[/note]] hard drive could often be purchased at or under US$200.[[note]] And the price has gotten even cheaper. As of December 2019, that 4 trillion-byte external hard drive is now available as made to military standards to survive a ''4-foot drop'' and still work flawlessly, and costs $120. They're not kidding about the size ether, in Windows, right-clicking on a drive and clicking on properties on one of these will inform you that, coming from the factory, formatted, the drive has "4,000,412,387,568 bytes free."[[/note]] That means data storage on modern hardware is ''thousands'' of times cheaper today, and that's before factoring in inflation.[[note]]It's impractical to use because of extremely slow random access, not because of low capacity and high cost. Most have moved on to modern tape cartridge drives, which have a capacity of up to [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tape_drive#History 12 terabytes.]][[/note]]
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13	In modern works, this trope shows up only in period pieces set before approximately 1975, or when dealing with technology built before then. Interestingly, although the use of audio cassettes for data storage on home computers was quite common in the late 70s and early 80s, no one ever mistook a tape deck for a CPU box.
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15	In the 1990s the films ''Film/ClearAndPresentDanger'' and ''Film/{{Eraser}}'' featured [=StorageTek PowderHorn=] robotic tape "silos".
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17	Superseded by ComputerEqualsMonitor. It might seem weird, but [[http://www.securitronlinux.com/bejiitaswrath/computer-tape-drives-coming-back-to-the-computers-of-2012/ the tape drive is not exactly extinct]] as a storage medium, and modern ones as of June 2018 can store up to 12 TB of data, or up to 30 TB if hardware compression is employed. Their niche today is generally backups for large multinational enterprises. Of course it's worth noting that they currently have no real technical advantage over hard drive backups, other than being compatible with older systems. As for appearing in film, most filmmakers give the modern drive a pass since modern LTO tape drives don't look anything like those tape drives of old and are so uncommon that not many people have seen one; the tapes look like small videocassettes (nothing like the big open-reel tapes that used to be common) and the drives mount in the same bays as CD/DVD drives. Not to mention that the lack of activity indicators on one and the inability to see the tape reels spinning, as well as the above-mentioned speed issue, makes it a very boring subject to film.
18	----
19	!!Examples:
20
21	[[foldercontrol]]
22
23	[[folder:Anime and Manga]]
24	* ''Literature/KinosJourney'': One country obviously has very highly advanced technology, but the computers there apparently still use tape drives.
25	[[/folder]]
26
27	[[folder:Comic Books]]
28	* ''ComicBook/{{Superman}}'':
29	** 1964 story arc ''ComicBook/TheUntoldStoryOfArgoCity'' shows the super-advanced Kryptonian's computers use reel-like tape drives.
30	** 1960's storylines ''ComicBook/TheUnknownSupergirl'' and ''ComicBook/TheGirlWithTheXRayMind'' introduce Lesla-Lar, a brilliant and mad Kryptonian scientist. She is capable of designing and building size-changing devices, memory-rewriting helmets and pocket teleporters. Her computers use tape drives.
31	* ''ComicBook/XMen'': In the original comic in the '60s, Cerebro had a tape drive.
32	[[/folder]]
33
34	[[folder:Films -- Live-Action]]
35	* In ''Film/CaptainAmericaTheWinterSoldier'', Cap and Black Widow stumble upon an old SHIELD lab and an early 80's-era computer complete with this function. It turns out that the computer is [[BrainUploading much more advanced]] than they initially thought.
36	* Sidney Bliss' dating agency in ''Film/CarryOnLoving'' features a matchmaking computer that involves lots of flashing lights and spinning reels of tape, all of which looks quite high gloss for 1970. However, it's all purely decorative - the "computer" is Sophie, Sid's "wife" (they're not actually married), who hides in the room behind the computer and simply picks matches at random from the names they have on file.
37	* In the film ''Film/FailSafe'' a (for then) large mainframe computer is focused upon, complete with tape drives.
38	* In ''Film/IronSky'', the moon-nazi scientist doesn't believe that a smartphone is really a computer. He points to, yes, a room-filling beast of a computer with tape reels and blinky lights and says, "That's (the phone) not a computer. ''This'' (room-filling beast with blinky lights etc) is a computer!" He's forced to admit his machine is woefully out-of-date upon actually ''using'' said phone. He then reverse-engineers the phone's USB jack and uses it to [[spoiler:run a space cruiser]].
39	* ''Film/HiddenFigures'': The huge new IBM mainframe that NASA acquire to speed up their calculations; yes, the whole system really takes up an enormous room, and yes, we do see the reels moving. Punched cards, too.
40	* In ''Film/TheItalianJob1969'', all the traffic lights in Turin were controlled by computer. The heroes caused a massive traffic jam by sneaking into the computer center and hanging a magtape that made the whole system go haywire. Presumably the control software read the tape automatically, as no other interaction was needed. It shouldn't have worked anyway - when the tape is shown being read, it's actually twisted over the heads, and should therefore be unreadable.
41	* In ''{{Film/Swordfish}}'', the villain hides a computer virus in a university's old 1970s tape drive, as that's the last place the good guys would look for it.
42	* ''Franchise/StarWars Episode IV: Film/ANewHope'' had one of the Imperial brass on the Death Star mention that said superweapon's plans were stored on tapes. The opening does say that the series is set a long time ago.
43	** [[http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/67.html Cue]] ''Webcomic/IrregularWebcomic'':
44	--->'''Darth Vader:''' We have the ability to destroy a planet and ''tape'' is the best backup medium we have?
45	** In ''Film/RogueOne'' we get to see said tapes, along with many others at the Imperial data center on Scarif. Makes one wonder whether it's an accident the storage units look so much like VHS boxes.
46	* NORAD in ''Film/{{Wargames}}'' has dozens of spinning tape drives and hard drive platters, which would be expected in the early '80s. But then an [[AIIsACrapshoot intelligent supercomputer named WOPR is installed]].
47	* In ''Film/WeirdScience'', also set in the '80s, Wyatt uses his home microcomputer to simulate a girl, but when he can't go further with it, Wyatt's friend Gary urges him to [[HollywoodHacking hack into a government mainframe to tap into its processing power]]. Several tape reels start spinning in the background as soon as he starts breaking in, and actually connecting to it brings a doll to life.
48	[[/folder]]
49
50	[[folder:Literature]]
51	* Creator/IsaacAsimov
52	** "Literature/PointOfView": When the story was published in ''Magazine/BoysLife'', it was accompanied by an illustration of the [[FloatingHeadSyndrome heads of Roger and Atkins]] floating in front of circuit boards and a tapedrive.
53	** "{{Literature/Profession}}": The information gained from NeuralImplanting in TheFuture is stored on tapes. The protagonist figures out that someone has to ''write the program'' in the first place, meaning that whoever created the computer tape doesn't learn things through the computer.
54	** "{{Literature/Someday}}":
55	*** In this story, Niccolo's Bard and Paul's book both use magnetic tape to store information.
56	*** In the art drawn for ''Magazine/InfinityScienceFiction'' (and reused for the [[AudioAdaptation audiobook]] cover), the mechanical Bard is shown to look like the classic computer tape drive.
57	* Creator/RobertWestall's ''Literature/FuturetrackFive'': Not quite the reel-to-reel, obviously spinning tape drives of the pre-701s computers, but datatapes is the term applied to portable computer data.
58	[[/folder]]
59
60	[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
61	* Averted in ''Series/AForAndromeda'' (written by astronomer Fred Hoyle who used computers in his work). The protagonist has to destroy ''all'' the components of the MasterComputer to be sure it won't be rebuilt.
62	* ''{{Series/Banacek}}'': In "If Max Is So Smart, Why Doesn't He Tell Us Where He Is?", the object stolen is Max, a 1970s supercomputer with spinning tape drives and blinking lights that takes up half a room.
63	* ''Series/DoctorWho'' in the 1960s, of course, although some episodes set in the future eschew the tape drives for more blinking lights. An {{JustForFun/egregious}} example in the First Doctor serial ''[[Recap/DoctorWhoS3E10TheWarMachines The War Machines]]'': [=WOTAN=], the MasterComputer, is chock full of blinking lights and tape drives - but ''so are the titular War Machines'', which were built on the mastercomputer's specifications. But that's not the best bit. The War Machines, which were largish mini tanks that roamed the streets of London, had the tape drives mounted on the outside.
64	* Graeme's computer in ''Series/TheGoodies'' featured a large, obvious tape drive, although that was far from the oddest thing about. Spoofed in the 2005 "Return of the Goodies" documentary where a now middle-aged Graeme tries to insert an enormous disk (or possibly tape cartridge) in his computer.
65	-->"I'll pop it on the laptop. Hang on, it's not compatible. I shall give it an upgrade. ''([[PercussiveMaintenance hits it with a mallet]])''
66	* ''Series/IDreamOfJeannie'': The giant, billion-dollar, brand new NASA computer in "The Girl Who Never Had A Birthday".
67	* In ''{{Series/Lost}}'', the computer room in the first hatch (Desmond's, the Swan, 2nd season) has 'em. Whether or not the inclusion is realistic, it's good for maintaining that Forbidding Doomsday Computer vibe. The overall effect of pairing this visual with the song "Make Your Own Kind of Music" is positively surreal (especially compared to the outdoors setting that formerly predominated). It's established later in the series that the installation and computer were set up in the late 70s and then [[spoiler:mostly]] isolated from the outside world, so the tape drives (and monochromatic text-prompt computer interface) are completely era-appropriate.
68	* In ''Series/TheManInTheHighCastle'', the Nazis have tape drives with [[SigilSpam swastikas]] on them.
69	* ''Series/OutOfThisWorld1962'': "[[Recap/OutOfThisWorldLittleLostRobot Little Lost Robot]]": The gallery, from where the characters conduct the [[BluffTheImpostor experiment]], has tape reels, [[BillionsOfButtons buttons and levers]], as well as [[BeepingComputers whirring and flashing lights]], which shows how complicated the machinery is in Hyperbase 7.
70	* ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'' had "memory tapes." (The TNG era sensibly replaced them with "isolinear chips", which seem to be a combination of flash memory cards and processing elements.) At its premier, TOS was virtually an ''aversion'' of the trope: yes, they were tapes, but they were hand-held tapes (about the size of a deck of cards) that could store HUGE amounts of data and be accessed very quickly, which at the time was laughably far-fetched. It would be the equivalent of a standard magnetic platter hard-drive the size of a postage stamp that could store the entire internet. [[WordOfGod The creators]] have actually come out and said that they ''didn't'' want to expressly use tapes or "normal computer processing noises," but thought it would have been [[WillingSuspensionOfDisbelief been too unfamiliar and broken the glamor]].
71	* From ''{{Series/Thunderbirds}}'', Thunderbird 5, the manned observation satellite from which poor, neglected John Tracy monitored the world's radio airwaves for distress calls, used reel-to-reel memory exclusively.
72	* ''Series/UFO1970'': In this Gerry and Sylvia Anderson series, a montage of flashing lights, spinning tape drives, blocky letters on coloured monitors, swaying female buttocks, and rows of large luminous buttons accompany every RedAlert.
73	* ''Series/WonderWoman1975'': I.R.A.C., the computer so smart that it knew Wonder Woman's secret identity and protected it, was shown frequently with spinning tape machines, the movement and sound of which indicated the computer processing some problem
74	[[/folder]]
75
76	[[folder:Music]]
77	* The [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fEiwzcbKq0Q music video]] for the song "Computer Games" by {{New Wave\|Music}} group Mi-Sex was filmed on location at what was then Control Data Corp's [[UsefulNotes/{{Sydney}} North Sydney]] processing centre. In 1979. It does overlap with ComputerEqualsMonitor though.
78	[[/folder]]
79
80	[[folder:Pinball]]
81	* ''Pinball/{{Pinbot}}'' has the "Computer Equals Blinking Lights" version, a giant robot with a bank of flashing multicolored lights in its chest. Turning on all the lights opens the visor to enable multiball.
82	* Creator/{{Zaccaria}}'s ''Pinball/{{Robot}}'' has a band of multicolored blinking lights around its torso.
83	[[/folder]]
84
85	[[folder:Video Games]]
86	* The memory banks from the videogame ''VideoGame/EvilGenius'' are big mainframes with a nine-track tape drive, which makes sense since the game is a 1960's DiabolicalMastermind simulator. Those items are a;sp pure memory banks, and the actual computing is done with a separate item looking more like a large desk (think N.A.S.A. computers in ''Apollo 13'').
87	* ''VideoGame/UltimaIII'': It is revealed that [[spoiler:BigBad Exodus is a computer. Evidently an older one too, as it is defeated when the player inserts a series of punch cards.]]
88	* ''VideoGame/TeamFortress2'' takes place in RetroUniverse version of the [=60s=] and [=70s=] where reel-to-reel computer banks abound in many maps, especially inaccessible background rooms. The Spy's [[https://wiki.teamfortress.com/wiki/Red-Tape_Recorder Red-Tape Recorder]], an unlockable replacement for [[AntiStructure the Electro-Sapper]], is a played with example; it has reels, but it's not clear if they serve a practical purpose or are just to [[ShoePhone "disguise" it as a tape-recorder]].
89	* Kaos, a major antagonist in ''VideoGame/DonkeyKongCountry3DixieKongsDoubleTrouble'', is a robot with a tape drive prominently featured in his design.
90	* The computers in ''VideoGame/{{Fallout}}'' are often found with tape drives. In ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 2}}'', these are described as being very modern reel-to-reel devices. Justified, given the slightly twisted alternate history the games exist in (e.g., the transistor was never invented in the ''Falloutverse''; the background went right on with a 1950s-esque vision of the future for more than a century, right up until the bombs fell).
91	* The Black Mesa facility in ''VideoGame/HalfLife1'' apparently still uses these in some areas. Seeing as many areas are converted Cold War-era missile silos and bunkers, it's possible some of the outdated equipment hasn't been replaced.
92	* Human computers in ''VideoGame/TheBureauXcomDeclassified''. Since it's set in 1962, totally justified. The game disc artwork is even printed to look like a reel of cold-war era computer tape
93	* Despite its future setting, the Vandenberg labs in ''VideoGame/DeusEx'' have a few tape decks running. Apparently they're capable of managing a Universal Constructor.
94	* The computers in ''VideoGame/BioShock2'''s "Minerva's Den" DLC feature visible, spinning tape drives like any computer from the period. Odder is the fact that the computer in question is able to dump its core data onto a device small enough for Dr. Tenenbaum to keep on her person.
95	* In the first mission in ''VideoGame/JazzPunk'', you run into a FemBot prostitute who has tape reels for breasts. The game doesn't take itself particularly seriously, if you hadn't guessed.
96	* ''VideoGame/WolfensteinTheNewOrder'' zig-zags this; the game is set in an AlternateUniverse where Nazi Germany won World War II thanks to [[StupidJetpackHitler super-science]] provided by the BigBad Deathshead. As a result, the Germans have personal computers and even an elaborate moon base in the 1960s... but the launch codes for a stolen nuclear submarine (which are stored at said moon base) come in the form of punch cards.
97	* ''VideoGame/CallOfDutyBlackOps'' features them, given its '60s setting. Memorably, one is used in the fourth mission as the basis for a [[PressXToNotDie Quick Time Event]] right before the shooting starts, wherein you sneak up on an unsuspecting guard and smash his head into the tape reel.
98	* ''VideoGame/{{Control}}'' includes them because [[CassetteFuturism the Oldest House doesn't get along with technology post-1985 or so.]] Reel-to-reel players are found in numerous locations holding audio logs to add to your [[StoryBreadcrumbs media collection.]]
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101	[[folder:Webcomics]]
102	* In ''Webcomic/TheInexplicableAdventuresOfBob'', not only does the [[Film/TheAdventuresOfBuckarooBanzaiAcrossThe8thDimension Yoyodyne]]-built [[https://bobadventures.thecomicseries.com/comics/203/ computer]] in the Generictown University Science Department have a tape drive (to be fair, the Dean's personal computer is a [[https://bobadventures.thecomicseries.com/comics/209/ TRS-80),]] but so does a random [[https://bobadventures.thecomicseries.com/comics/416 gizmo]] on the alien planet of Butane.
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105	[[folder:Web Videos]]
106	* {{Lampshade\|Hanging}}d in ''WebVideo/FreemansMind'' when Gordon enters an old but still in-use rocket test site. Despite being under attack from an EldritchAbomination, it is the sight of a tape drive (and punch cards; see the page quote) that sends him to a raging rant.
107	[[/folder]]
108
109	[[folder:Western Animation]]
110	* In ''WesternAnimation/DuckTales1987'', Glomgold's computer in "Wrong way to Ronguay" is of this type.
111	* Played with in ''WesternAnimation/MegasXLR'' in the episode "Viva Las Megas", which features [[MonsterOfTheWeek R.E.C.R]], a giant military robot built in the 60's. It has a tape reel and a "massive" 56-kilobyte processor; Coop taunts it by telling it he's got ten-year-old video games that are more technologically advanced than it is.
112	* In ''WesternAnimation/TheVentureBrothers'', the computer system that stores [[spoiler:the minds of the Venture brothers]] is apparently run on tape.
113	** In another episode, [[spoiler:malevolent supercomputer]] M.U.T.H.eR. is on a reel-to-reel mainframe. {{Lampshade\|Hanging}}d when M.U.T.H.eR. [[spoiler:tries to launch a nuclear missile]]; while everyone else is panicking, Pete White mentions that a computer that runs on such an ancient mainframe (and uses a dial-up modem) can't act very quickly.
114	* In one of the numerous ''WesternAnimation/SpongeBobSquarePants'' TV specials, the Atlanteans have a giant machine which can shrink people down to the size of viruses, and everyone's data gets stored on a magnetic tape drive.
115	* A first season episode of the ''WesternAnimation/SuperFriends'' featured the G.E.E.C., a computer that could replace all the world's laborers. It filled many rooms and sported several reel-to-reel tape drives.
116	* In one episode of ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}'', Bender hangs a pinup of a tape deck computer. [[spoiler:Fry approves]].
117	** Fry had just hung a pinup of a girl in a bikini. The large round tape reels in Bender's picture have just the right placement to invite comparison to certain large round objects in Fry's picture.
118	[[/folder]]
119
120	[[folder:Real Life]]
121	* Surprisingly, magnetic tape drives ''are'' still used in the modern day, and new developments are still being made; as of December 2017, Ultrium LTO-8 tapes are available, storing 12TB of uncompressed data (30TB compressed, with an effective hardware compression ratio of 2.5:1). They're mainly stored in a backup location far from the main site of the source data, used as a long-lived backup and/or to replace data in case of a disaster. The reason is that magnetic tapes can be easily swapped quickly (since only the tape needs to be replaced) while hard drives cannot (unless the center pays for a hard drive that can, which can cost thousands). Also, when properly stored, in a dry and climate-controlled environment, magnetic tapes last for ''decades'', moreso than hard drives or [=CDs=]. It should be noted, however, that [[https://tapeandmedia.com/hp-lto-8-tape-ultrium-tapes-q2078A.asp these modern tapes look absolutely nothing like the reel-to-reel tapes of yesteryear]]. In particular you can't see the reels or magnetic strip without disassembling them.
122	* In the [[MediaNotes/The8bitEraOfConsoleVideoGames 8-bit Era]] of home computers [[labelnote:Examples]]Commodore 64, Sinclair ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC, Dragon, TRS-80 etc.[[/labelnote]] software was available on cassette tapes, which were the exact same format as the Compact Cassettes. In fact, certain systems [[labelnote:Examples]]ZX Spectrum and TRS-80 Color Computer in particular, as well as the Apple ][,[[/labelnote]] actually used standard cassette players as their tape "drives" and you could hear the software if you played the software tapes in a standard Hi-Fi (which also meant that a dual deck cassette deck of the sort that was common in the early 1990s made a perfect copying device!).[[note]]However, if you used the high speed dubbing setting (tempting as it sounds like an unholy screech) it would be unreadable[[/note]] If you did your own programming you could record to them as well, making them the exact precursor to home use floppy drives. While North American users quickly moved on to faster floppy drives, cassettes remained the main data storage medium on 8-bit computers in Europe until they were superseded by more powerful machines because floppy drives were too expensive.
123	** [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BASICODE BASICODE ]] was developed specifically to unify the multiple BASIC implementations in order to broadcast computer code over the radio. By recording a tape and loading it into your computer through an interpreter, you'd essentially downloaded a program using the radio.
124	** The Platform/{{Famicom}}, the Japanese version of the Platform/NintendoEntertainmentSystem, has a tape recorder accessory that works in tandem with the Famicom Keyboard to let one save and recall the programs they've written in Famicom BASIC onto tape. Some games (like ''VideoGame/WreckingCrew'') even use the Famicom Keyboard and tape recorder to make save games before battery backed RAM and flash memory were affordable solutions to include on cartridges. To load (precompiled) games directly from tape, however, requires a third party device called a Fukutake Studybox. None of these devices left Japan.
125	** 8-track computers were [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin computers built around a mono 8track drive.]] These computers took advantage of the, well, eight tracks and would switch from one track to other as part of the flow chart of the operation, allowing a weak processor (even for the era) to have a much more streamlined user experience. Typically, these were installed in board games and other home gadgets.
126	* Donald E. Knuth's seminal ''[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_Computer_Programming Art of Computer Programming]]'' includes how to best sort data on one or two tape drives, and whether the tape can be read backwards or not. First published in 1973 when tape drives were much more common.
127	[[/folder]]

Context Main / ComputerEqualsTapedrive