Storage — Then and now

In 1956, the IBM RAMAC system 350 Disk File stored about 5 megabytes and required a fork-lift to load onto an airplane (see left picture below). It's hard to estimate a cost, because IBM never sold the disk drive individually, only leased it as part of a full system, but a fair estimate might be $50,000.

Now, fifty years later, a hundred times as much data can be stored on a device which costs just $50 and hangs on your keychain.