microdrive

English

Sinclair ZX Microdrive unit from the 1980s

Etymology

micro- +‎ drive

Pronunciation

• Audio (UK):

  (file)

Noun

microdrive (plural microdrives)

1. (computing) An early computer storage system using cartridges of looped tape.
   • 1984, Alison Maguire, interviewed in SINCLAIR talks... (in Crash magazine, issue 3, April 1984) [1]

     There are lots of things that will benefit from being on a microdrive cartridge but if you release something on microdrive you're only going to sell it to people with microdrive.

   • 1986, African Energy Programme (Commonwealth Science Council), Renewable energy development in Africa (volume 2, page 161)

     The Spectrum has its own inexpensive mass storage unit - the microdrive which starts at about £150 for 100k of storage, but this may not be suitable in all cases, since the storage unit may be damaged if turned on with the disc in position.

   • 1989, Phil South, Rage Hard (in Your Sinclair magazine, June 1989) [2]

     Disk interfaces have been around since the year dot, as people soon realised that the microdrive was unreliable, unstable and generally rubbish for the storage of anything, useless except as a rather small beermat.

2. A device for inserting microelectrodes into the brain.
   • 2014, Masami Tatsuno, Analysis and Modeling of Coordinated Multi-neuronal Activity (page 23)

     The microdrive was invented so that electrodes could be lowered into the brain in order to isolate new neurons.

See also

• stringy floppy