[kwlug-disc] Nuclear 8" floppy disks [ was Re: Hard disk smartctl errors]

[Khalid Baheyeldin]

On Tue, Apr 29, 2014 at 11:13 PM, unsolicited <unsolicited at swiz.ca> wrote:

> P.S. If you saw 60 minutes last Sunday, you would have seen that the U.S.
> nuke silo's still use 8" floppies. They studied the security aspects of
> their systems, and such systems are considered more secure than more modern
> storage media/methods.
>
> - but they can't find parts to be able to close/lock the vault doors. Go
> figure. (Early 60's era.)


Did not see the show, but read about it afterwards.

The first mainframe I ever worked on (mid 1980s), read its firmware from 8"
disk after it was powered up. And after it read one side, it would instruct
the operator to flip the floppy to the other side then continue to read the
firmware.

That model of the mainframe was the first of its family in the Middle East
to not require a card reader!
-- 
Khalid M. Baheyeldin
2bits.com, Inc.
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