Why still use tape?

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metalfoot76
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Why still use tape?

Post by metalfoot76 »

[MOD: continues from here]
Thanks for this; but should you really need to worry too much about tape loading address issues in the SD2IEC era? Genuine question.
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tokra
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Re: Why still use tape?

Post by tokra »

metalfoot76 wrote:Thanks for this; but should you really need to worry too much about tape loading address issues in the SD2IEC era? Genuine question.
Should you really need too worry too much about VIC-20 in the PC-era? Genuine answer! :mrgreen:
metalfoot76
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Re: Why still use tape?

Post by metalfoot76 »

tokra wrote:
metalfoot76 wrote:Thanks for this; but should you really need to worry too much about tape loading address issues in the SD2IEC era? Genuine question.
Should you really need too worry too much about VIC-20 in the PC-era? Genuine answer! :mrgreen:
Fair enough; but I'm thinking in terms of stability of storage and the computer being the key rather than the datasette?
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tokra
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Re: Why still use tape?

Post by tokra »

metalfoot76 wrote:
tokra wrote:
metalfoot76 wrote:Thanks for this; but should you really need to worry too much about tape loading address issues in the SD2IEC era? Genuine question.
Should you really need too worry too much about VIC-20 in the PC-era? Genuine answer! :mrgreen:
Fair enough; but I'm thinking in terms of stability of storage and the computer being the key rather than the datasette?
Well, in that terms, probably not. But retro-computing has different flavors. Some are content with emulators, some like the real machine but are ok with modern storage. Some are completely retro and don't even use disk-drives or memory expansions. To each his own. From a scientific standpoint Mike pointed out any possibility including tape.
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Re: Why still use tape?

Post by Jeff-20 »

Tape is important to me.
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Mike
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Re: Why still use tape?

Post by Mike »

Tape is a legit storage device, and especially for the unexpanded VIC-20, the load times aren't that long.

There's even tape support built into MINIGRAFIK and MINIPAINT. Pop quiz: without reading the manual of these two tools, how would you go to signal the user to PRESS (RECORD &) PLAY ON TAPE, when the standard output interferes with the graphics screen in a destructive way? The routine in MG doing this job was valuable enough to me to spend 56 bytes on it.

One other question though: thus far, the thread is a good reference, and even I often refer to it. Could this recent discussion (beginning with this post and ending with this one here) perhaps be split off into an own topic (like: 'Why still use tape?') so it doesn't clutter up the current thread?
Last edited by Mike on Sat Jun 14, 2014 4:41 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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orion70
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Re: Why still use tape?

Post by orion70 »

Done :)
Kept the topic in "Programming" because it's about datassette in programs, if I understand correctly.
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Re: Why still use tape?

Post by rhurst »

Tape is important, it was the storage medium for VIC 20. I understand that it continued its popularity in Europe with C64 and the TED computers, too.

Proper archiving and emulation of it is also just as important.

Using tape today is another matter completely. I'd rather stick an ice pick in my eye than subject myself (again) to datasette operations. Yet, I still bought a small fresh supply of 10-minute audio tapes for my PET and VIC. :twisted:
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orion70
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Re: Why still use tape?

Post by orion70 »

Loading and saving programs and data on a tape still retains a strong retro appeal. No real-VIC setup should be without a datassette. I really like the older PET-type, even if the smaller model 1530 maybe fits better the design of VIC case (well, this is "Collecting and History", isn't it? :P)
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Re: Why still use tape?

Post by metalfoot76 »

I do have a Datasette (actually, two of them, come to think of it). I just remember tape being a much more frustrating load device than disk. Thanks for putting up with my questions! :) I love Commodore computers and it does my inner 12-year-old well to have a complete complement of the computers featured in the Compute's Gazette magazines of my youth.
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Re: Why still use tape?

Post by highinfidelity »

Like many of you, I also remember being frequently annoyed by ?LOAD ERRORs and similar stuff. That was a major disappointment, no doubt about it. Everybody hated the Datassette and wanted a floppy drive back then, at least in my neighbourhood.

Reconsidering all things under today's perspective, however, I must also admit that most if not all of the problems used to spring out with tape cassettes bought with magazines and such. These were mostly recorded with high-speed dubbers on cheap (well: crappy) magnetic tape. Also, tapes borrowed from friends with messed-up or mismatched azimuth calibration were troublesome. What the Commodore Datassette really lacked was a small loudspeaker, or a headphone jack, or any other gauge or device to adjust the heads' azimuth properly. It had to be done working in the dark, mostly making further damage.

But if left untouched and used with medium-to-high quality Hi-Fi compact cassettes to save own programs, the Commodore Datassette was generally very reliable in my experience.

I have recently unburied a stack of (my own) forgotten tapes, which have been held for 30-something years unused in an attic, exposed to extreme temperatures (both high and low), humidity and the four winds, and with my suprise all of them still loaded perfectly.

My Datassette, in turn, has also 30+ years, and it has never been serviced. So, all things considered, in my opinion the Datassette + tape combo was effective and reliable.

As already pointed out by others, load times were very reasonable as well. It takes more time to install an average program on a modern desktop computer than to load an average VIC 20 program with the Datassette.
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Re: Why still use tape?

Post by Mike »

At that time, the datasette I owned had its head particularly well aligned. It would literally load everything, own tapes, tapes recorded by my friends, commercial games. Of course I had also my share of ?LOAD ERRORS, nearly all of them caused by (own, accidental) truncated recordings. I never changed the alignment of the head, as I knew then all bets would be off. Rather I just cleaned the head with isopropyl alcohol in case I suspected some dirt had set on the head, and told my friends to do the same, in case they complained they couldn't read one tape written by me.

Later, I took the datasette over to my C128 and it remained in service there (together with a 1571 and 1581, and using all brands of turbo tape) without any big hassles over the time until 1991, when I sold off that system, changed platform to Acorn and continued with an Archimedes. :)

As a conclusion, I don't have any particularly bad memories about tape usage - but of course they're not as convenient as using floppies, and again, the latter ones are not nearly as convenient as using SD cards. :mrgreen:
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Re: Why still use tape?

Post by orion70 »

A question to all the datassette experts out there: is it true that misaligned heads can record and read files without errors, but those files don't work with correctly aligned datassettes? In other terms: if I had a particularly misaligned device, I couldn't read Mike's files, and so Mike couldn't read mine... In a way, one could record "secret files" (e.g., your secret diary with a word processor) with his bad datassette, and no one would have been able to read them, unless their head was misaligned exactly in the same way. Is it technically correct, or only a common urban legend of the Italian Eighties :)?
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Re: Why still use tape?

Post by groepaz »

totally correct and absolutely common situation back in the days =)
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Re: Why still use tape?

Post by pitcalco »

I have just begun reading a book I retrieved from the Bombjack site, namely Cassette Book for the Commodore 64 and VIC-20. It seems to promise that the Datasette can be used in much more efficient and powerful ways than are typically documented and even that they can be made to work faster than disk drives!

Before I delve much further into book and take on the projects listed within, I wanted to ask if anyone else here has experience in the sort of things set out in that book and how pleased anyone here may have been with the results.
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