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"…we store information differently, reading a science fiction story, to make it make sense."
- Samuel R. Delany

Ampek F-a2 Recording System  
  A device that incorporated a living protoplasm, used as a recording and playback system.  

Nat Flieger reflexively poured water into a cup and fed the living protoplasm incorporated into the Ampek F-a2 recording system which he kept in his office; the Ganymedean life form did not experience pain and had not yet objected to being made over into a portion of an electronic system... neurologically it was primitive, but as an auditory receptor it was unexcelled.

Water trickled through the membranes of the Ampek F-a2 and was gratefully absorbed; the conduits of the living system pulsed. I could take you along, Flieger decided. It was portable... Flieger... walked to the window of his office to switch the blind to receive; warm Mexican sunlight burst in and he blinked. The F-a2 went into a state of extreme activity, then, utilizing the sunlight and the water, its metabolic processes stimulated.

Technovelgy from The Simulacra, by Philip K. Dick.
Published by Ace in 1964
Additional resources -

See also the swibble from Dick's 1955 story Service Call.

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Additional resources:
  More Ideas and Technology from The Simulacra
  More Ideas and Technology by Philip K. Dick
  Tech news articles related to The Simulacra
  Tech news articles related to works by Philip K. Dick

Ampek F-a2 Recording System-related news articles:
  - 'Mechanical Tumor' Meatspace Expression Of Computer Stress
  - Neurochip A Living Brain On A Silicon Chip
  - Biotic Video Games Use Living Cells
  - Cyborg Tissues Combine Transistors and Cells
  - Human On A Chip
  - Graphene Cytobot - Cyborg Bacterial Spores May Help Astronauts
  - Cyborg Cardiac Patch Combines Organics And Electronics
  - Devices Powered By Bacteria In Your Future

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