Magnetic storage - Definition and Overview

Magnetic storage is a term from engineering referring to the storage of data on a magnetised medium. Magnetic storage was first suggested by Obeline Smith in 1888. The first magnetic recorder was invented by Valdemar Poulsen in 1895.

Media types that exploit magnetic storage include hard disk and floppy disk drives, zip drives and various tape drives, video cassettes and audio cassettes, magnetic core memory, thin film memory and drum memory.

A new type of magnetic storage, called MRAM, is being produced that stores data in terms of polarity rather than electric charge. The advantage to this is that it will require far less electricity and will still remain intact in case of a crash.