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Data Storage News

24 November 2006

Store 256GB on an A4 sheet

By Chris Mellor, Techworld

How much information can you store on an A4 sheet? Well, according to some new technology designed by an Indian engineering student, an extraordinary 256GB.

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With new "rainbow technology", devised by Sainul Abideen who has just completed an MCA degree in Kerala, data can be encoded into coloured geometric shapes and stored in dense patterns on paper.

Files such as text, images, sounds and video clips are encoded in "rainbow format" as coloured circles, triangles, squares and so on, and printed as dense graphics on paper at a density of 2.7GB per square inch. The paper can then be read through a specially developed scanner and the contents decoded into their original digital format and viewed or played. The encoding and decoding processes have not been revealed.

Using this technology an A4 sheet of paper could store 256GB of data. In comparison, a DVD can store 4.7GB of data. The Rainbow technology is feasible because printed text, readable by the human eye is a very wasteful use of the potential capacity of paper to store data. By printing the data encoded in a denser way much higher capacities can be achieved.

Update: But following this article and widespread coverage of the claims, the claimed storage technology has been widely and roundly dismissed as not possible. See our article "Can you get 256GB on an A4 sheet? No way!" for a full rundown.

We have also come across some interesting new technology from Xerox for the next generation of barcodes, where huge amounts of information are stored in a tiny readable space.

Paper is, of course, bio-degradable, unlike CDs or DVDs. And sheets of paper also cost a fraction of the cost of a CD or DVD.

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Abideen has demonstrated a 45-second video clip being encoded on paper, termed by him, a rainbow video disk - RVD - and then played back through a computer with an RVD scanner attached. In another demonstration he has shown 432 A4 pages of paper rainbow format-encoded and stored on a two-inch by two-inch square of paper.

He says that smaller scanners could fit inside laptop computers or mobile phones, and read SIM card-sized RVD's containing 5GB of data.

The recording media could be either paper or plastic sheets. Such media are making a comeback - witness yesterday's story about re-writable paper.

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Comments received


Ozzy Osborn (no relation) said on Tuesday, 05 June 2007

if this is true then we are looking a the revolution in computers! this makes me wonder, would you be able to scan the paper onto you computer and store that 256GB as a jpeg or some other picture format? if this is possible then the storage possibility's are endless! if any one knows if this is possible pleas e-mail me at somkey440@rock.com or gmail.com

Harish Pandian said on Saturday, 30 June 2007

I wonder that how can a A4 sheet can accomadate 256 GB in it.. What is the technology behined it in storing..

Jack Dawson said on Wednesday, 11 July 2007

I think this statement is made by Mr. Chris Miller who is trying to degrade Mr. Sainul Abideens statement on rainbow storage system.

Jack Dawson said on Wednesday, 11 July 2007

The complete statement of Mr. Sainul Abideen is in keral com link below
www.keral.com/Happenings/RAINBOW_TECHNOLOGY.htm

DENNIS MULLIGAN said on Thursday, 26 July 2007

Sound to good to be true? Just go back 20 - 30 years and try to imagin the storage devices that we now have in 2007. Sounds to me that Mr. Sainul Abideens might just have hit on an idea that could cost our big R & D guys a fortune. I say let them all have at it, and good luck to the first dog to the finish line.

sundar ganesh said on Saturday, 04 August 2007

Is it an ordinary A4 sheet or anything else designed speacially for this type of storage? I need some more explanations about the storing techniques in RVD and more images based on that. Send answers for my questions to sundarganesh_1987@yahoo.co.in.......

Swapnil said on Monday, 27 August 2007

It might happen like, this is a basic idea... and can achieve 2.7 GB in future. but no one can fade the idea of storing data with the help of geometry and colors. and the way round, you can compress a word of 6 to 7 letters to a shape or color and this automatically compresses the information. so actual data is different, it might be compressed to a format (of lesser size) and then might be printed on paper. again while reading, a reverse process can be applied as : read 100 kb geometry, comvert and extract meaning (about 1000 kb).

swapnil.thepade@neilsoft.com

neuromancer said on Tuesday, 11 September 2007

When we have processors with Paper ?

niraj said on Friday, 28 September 2007

how's it possible if possible than it will change the world great go on research and make it true . i know that indians can do it

John said on Thursday, 11 October 2007

Multi-data can be stored on paper and scanned back on a standard scanner. This was demonstrated years ago on bbc's tomorrows world. I tried the downloadable square which consisted of black & white dots, which when scanned into the program provided gave layers of music pictures and text which were of good quality. I hope this information will be of help to your readers.

hmmm said on Tuesday, 20 November 2007

it makes sense, and it would be useful, i hope it's real, because alot of people are saying it isn't possible

kiran peter c said on Thursday, 06 December 2007

IT MAY BE POSSIBLE BUT I WANT MORE &DETAIL EXPLANATION ABOUT IT

kiranpeterc@gmail.com

ANAS.P.K said on Saturday, 17 May 2008

It is amaizing ?????????? wow what a technology he shoud be appreciated...

Krishna Murthy B said on Wednesday, 24 September 2008

Need to know more about this.

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