Earlier models of the MessagePad were not well received due to the poor battery life and variable quality of the built-in hardwriting recognition. The Model 110, represented here, ran on 4 AA batteries, and included much improved software, not only for the handwriting recognition, but also inter device communications. Originally intended to "reinvent" personal computing, the hardware and Newton OS fell prey to fears that it would cut into Macintosh sales, so was "reinvented" as a PDA, or Personal Digital Assistant. It was then marketed as an accessory to the Macintosh, not a replacement for it. Although not the first device of this type (the Psion Organizer was marketed in 1984), the Apple President John Sculley. In a CNET interview, Sculley estimated that the Newton project cost US $100 million to develop and market.

Magnetic-core memory is an early form of random-access computer memory. It uses tiny magnetic rings, the cores, through which wires are threaded to write and read information. Each core represents one bit of information. The cores can be magnetically polarized in two different ways and that bit stored in a core is zero or one depending on that core's polarity. The wires are arranged to allow an individual core to be set to either polarity, and for its polarity to be sensed, by sending appropriate current pulses through selected wires. This represents 100 bits, and was originally contracted for use in early IBM computers.

Introduced as a follow-up to the Gateway Handbook (1992), the Gateway 2000 Colorbook exhibits an Intel 804865SX at 25Mhz, RAM capacity offered in 4, 8, 12, 20 MB, 80 MB hard disk drive, and featured 256 different colors. The relative worth of $1,995.00 from 1994 is: $2,940.00 using the Consumer Price Index.

Texas Instruments (TI), once the world's largest semiconductor manufacturer, introduced the Compact Computer 40 (CC-40) in 1983. The CC-40 was very 'cute', and TI's first entry into the portable computer market. The Hex-Bus interface allows external devices to be attached, like Hex-Bus printers, modems, and an expansion interface.

The HP41C series programmable calculators offered the first alphanumeric capabilities and featured ports for memory expansion. The HP-41CV calculator offered 4 ports for memory expansion and ultimately provided 5 times the memory of the first HP-41C model.

Hard disk drives are non-volatile, random access devices for digital data. They are comprised of rotating rigid plates or motor-driven spindle within a protective enclosure. An example of a complete hard disk drive is nearby. Because destruction of data on hard disk drives is largely ineffective by merely overwriting the data, they must be shredded before recycling. This is what is left after shredding. Mines periodically shreds old drives to ensure data security and privacy.

The Colby Systems Walkmac SE-30 is essentially the Macintosh SE/30 repackaged in a portable 16-pound case. It features a 9-inch backlit LCD screen, 20 or 40 MB hard drive disk, 16 MHz processor, and 256 KB of RAM. This was a quite expensive alternative to a desktop Mac. Today's price would be $11,300.

The Sharp Mobilon Tripad PV-6000 is a handheld computer featuring 16 MB of RAM and upgradeable ROM. It allowed the user to surf the internet while on the go and had 16 hour lithium ion battery life, LCD touch screen display and backlight, and came included with Microsoft Windows CE V2.2 Handheld PC Professional Edition.

The Iomega Zip 100 is designed for PCs, and provides 100 MB of parallel port external storage. This allows for 100 MB of data to be transported on removable media and uses a disk resembling a thicker floppy disk. Its popularity was relatively short-lived as it was soon replaced by inexpensive CD writers.

Magnetic tape, first used for data storage on the UNIVAC I computer in 1951, was the de facto standard used for large computer systems through the 1980s. The large 8-inch open reels were gradually replaced with cartridge tape systems. The major advantage of tape was its relatively low cost and the fact that the media could be swapped, for virtually unlimited amount of storage. The main disadvantage is that tape is a serial access media, slowing access to any individual bit of data. Tape can still be a viable storage media for large systems. As of 2011, the highest capacity tape cartridges can store up to 5TB of data.