Gustav Tauschek - Drum Memory

The historical drum memory is considered the predecessor of the computer hard disk. It was developed by the prolific inventor Gustav Tauschek.

The Viennese Gustav Tauschek (1899-1945) was a pioneer of information technology, even though his inventions had little economic success. He constructed numerous improved punch card machines, especially accounting, counting, and calculating machines.

The American IT corporation IBM bought and marketed many of his approximately 200 patents. Gustav Tauschek developed the drum memory in 1932.

Memory units are arranged in tracks on a movable drum that has a magnetic alloy, and each of these tracks can be accessed with its own read/write heads. Drum memories based on Tauschek’s concept were widely used in the 1950s and 1960s.