As we glide our fingers over the screens of our smartphones and tablets, or chatter to our computer instead of typing at it, it is easy to forget how far input devices have evolved since the first ...

Before the Commodore 64, the IBM PC, and even the Apple I, most computers took input data from a type of non-magnetic storage medium that is rarely used today: the punched card. These pieces of ...

Chris Fenton hopes to build a working electromechanical computer out of parts made by a 3D printer. He has currently developed a working prototype of a punch card reader. Chris Fenton hopes to build a ...

Over at Royal Pingdom there’s a fascinating little picture history of computer storage from the year dot nearly up to the present day. Who knew that hard disks were once the size of a small car? Not ...

(1) See loyalty punch card. (2) An early storage medium made of thin cardboard stock that held data as patterns of punched holes. Also called "punched" cards, each of the 80 or 96 columns held one ...