Howdy, Group,

Been having a conversation with this guy regarding tape vs disc.

He asked if a hard or floppy disk was more like a tape recorder, or a
record player.

I'm siding with record player, due to tape's inability to have random
access.

I know, record players are WORM drives, and they don't record with metal
oxide, but the random access feature seems so important that it
outweighs tape's next-bit-in-line way of reading data.

(Or, it's at least *as* important. But in my view, if tape could really
have random access, we wouldn't be using the current much more expensive
disc drive technology. On another front, imagine the wait time involved
in getting to the last sector of a 50 terrabyte file with tape!)

And yes, I understand that a traditional analog record player is
actually reading sequentially, (as does tape, further muddying the
distinction between the two), but at least it's *possible* to pick up
the needle & jump straight to another point on the record. With tape
you have to wade through the intervening portions to get to that next
read point.

He keeps claiming that tape *can* have random access. Were this the
case, of course discs would be more like a tape recorder, as the random
vs sequential access argument would be thrown out of the discussion.

Supposing that I am wrong, is there any place one could look to show how
tape could have random access?

I don't mean some backup companies sales text *calling* it random, I
mean the actual ability for a tape to jump straight from one block to
another without moving past all intervening data.

Sure, you can *call* it random if you fast-forward or reverse to the
next block, but there are many examples in our society of folks claiming
something with one term while it really means another.

As a brief example, say you want to go from block 100 to block 200 on a
tape device. How could one possibly do that without having to at least
go past blocks 101 through 199 on your way?

Given the constraints of three-dimensional space, I just don't see how
it can be done.

Any thoughts?