logoalt Hacker News

somattoday at 6:00 PM0 repliesview on HN

On a related subject, physical media, like a song album. I started by wondering if there were ever any solid state distribution options (One Company tried SD cards) and then started digging into the underlying storage tech to see if I could find a write once long term stable process.

First the elephant in the room. Why solid state? because the drives to read the media are often the weak link. When the drives are no longer being manufactured how hard is it to make one? reading solid state drives is a relatively low precision electrical process compared to the high precision mechanical process needed for most media.

First on the chopping block was bulk storage. It tends to be delicate and hard to read and short lifespans. But if I limited myself to small storage there are some interesting options. fusible proms were promising but top out at a few megabytes. Mask roms? does anyone offer a mask rom service anymore?

Put a mask rom into a sd card... no, sd cards are too physically small. For a song album we want something bigger to put album art on. A thing the size of the original gameboy cartridge with a usb interface and a mask rom?

My conclusion, for that specific goal, indefinite future storage of a song album. Vinyl records. low tech enough that it is easy to make a player for them.