Peripheral Products

	Storage - Magnetic Tape Drives Selection:
7970 Tape Drive
Product Number: 7970
Introduced: 1970
Price: $4600
7970A	Catalogue Reference: 1971 Supplement, page 39

Description:

Donated by: Steve Brazzale (7970B), Australian Computer Museum Society (7970A/E).

The 7970 was the first tape drive entirely designed and manufactured by HP for use with its computers.

The 7970 10.5 inch reel to reel tape drives were the primary means of back up and off line storage for HP 1000 and 3000 systems in the 1970s. These machines were nine track drives with a write speed of 45 inches per second. The 7970B had a storage density of 800 cpi and a data transfer rate of 36 characters per second. The 7970E had a storage capacity of 1600 cpi and a data transfer rate of 72 characters per second. It was priced at $8,100. The 7971A was introduced in 1982. It consisted of a full-height, 19-inch rack bundled with one or two 7970B/E tape drives. It was priced at $16,000 with a single drive.

The 2022A was introduced in 1972. The 2022A was a magnetic tape reformatting system, used to convert magnetic tapes to Computer Output Microfilm (COM). The 2022A included a 7970 tape drive, 2100A mini computer and a 9860A card reader.

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