Scott Baker’s Magnetic Bubble Memory Mega-Post
Over on his blog our hacker [Scott Baker] has a Magnetic Bubble Memory Mega-Post.
If you haven’t heard of magnetic bubble memory before it’s basically obsolete nonvolatile memory. Since the 1970s when it was introduced this type of memory has been outperformed in every dimension including durability, reliability, price, density, performance, and so on. For any given application of bubble memory you will be able to find an alternative technology which is better in many ways. Except if you want some old tech to geek out over, in that case magnetic bubble memory is for you!
In his article [Scott] begins by introducing the Intel 7110 Bubble Memory branded variously as “Intel Magnetics” and “Memtech”. These chips are marked up with what [Scott] explains are a defect map. The defect map is for indicating which storage areas are defective so they can be avoided. This map is printed atop the package and also stored in the bubble memory itself. [Scott] says the engineering samples have the defect map set to “FF”, but it’s not clear if that means “defective” or “not defective”. If you know, please do enlighten us in the comments!
In his fascinating and detailed notes [Scott] goes on to discuss various multibus boards, which can integrate multiple memories; and mutlimodules, which can plug in to multibus boards. [Scott] shows off photos of clone multimodules and boards he made himself. He goes on to discuss HP 98259 bubble memory boards, the Memtech bubble memory cassette system, the Allen Bradley 8000MBC bubble memory cassette, Heathkit H8 bubble memory boards, and our favorite Scott’s Basic Bubble Computer. We have discussed magnetic bubble memory here on Hackaday before in articles such as Magnetic Bubble Memory Brought To Life On Heathkit and Magnetic Bubble Memory Farewell Tour.
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