A 1970s Cray-1 hard drive has been imaged
Specs on storage module drive: http://ia600707.us.archive.org/32/items/9760_9762_oct73/9760... .The unit has an average seek time of 30ms in 1973. Today, in common 7200 RPM drives, it seems to be around 8-9ms. There is only a factor of improvement of 3 to 4 times.I find this pleasantly surprising.