A few weeks back, we reflected on some of the worst storage mediums of all time. From reel-to-reel to HD-DVD, those deplorable storage devices induced groans and eye-rolls across the board. As something of a palette cleanser, let’s take a moment to commemorate the best storage mediums we’ve ever seen.

While Spanish cave paintings and Gutenberg’s printing press were massive jumps forward in terms of storing information, this article is focused strictly on the modern era. There are many more variants than I could possibly account for, so today we’ll only be focus on the five very best storage mediums.

Magnetic tape

Okay, I’ll admit that this entry is a bit of a cop-out. I’m not really calling out one specific implementation, but I will take this opportunity to sing the praises of magnetic tape as an affordable way to back-up massive amounts of data. From the Uniservo in the 1950s to the 185TB tape announced earlier this year, magnetic tape has served as a reliable and affordable way of storing data for the vast majority of computing history.

There have been plenty of poor implementations over the years, and both reel-to-reel and VHS made it onto our list of worst mediums. However, magnetic tape has been a versatile mainstay throughout most of the last century. Portable audio players, home video players, and industrial storage solutions all came to prominence thanks to magnetic tape. Even many of the first games for the ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64, and Atari came on tape. Without these thin magnetic strips, there is a good possibility that the information age would have been stillborn.

Next page: The 3.5-inch floppy and the CD hold down the fort throughout the ’80s and ’90s