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A hard drive is a metal plate with magnetic surfaces used for data storage in personal computers and other devices. It consists of an actuator arm assembly, read and write heads, and a rectangular metal container. New technologies, such as solid-state drives, are competing with hard drives. Hard drives need to be defragmented, while solid-state drives do not.
A hard drive is a metal plate with magnetic surfaces and is a component of a hard disk drive. Hard disk equipment reads and writes to the disk surface. This type of drive is common in most personal computers, as well as other large devices that include data storage.
In a hard drive, an actuator arm assembly locates the cylinders of the platter so it can read and write to the disk. The read and write heads act as agents for these functions. The total set fits into a rectangular metal container. In traditional computing, the hard drive was the internal structure for storing data in a workstation or personal computer. External disks were called “floppy disks” because they had soft internal supports. The emergence of new types of drives has rendered floppy disk technology largely obsolete.
Today, a hard drive can be part of an internal hard drive or an external drive that connects to a computer. Internal and external drives provide a common method for storing many executable programs. They also provide a stable way to hold many gigabytes of data in a separate drive that can be disconnected from a laptop or desktop computer. An innovation called perpendicular magnetic recording (PMR) is increasing the amount of data a hard drive can hold.
Hard drives are getting competition from other new technologies including the flash drive. A flash drive is a solid state drive, where a new form of data storage replaces circular hard drive technology. Your hard drive and solid state drive often share the same USB connections to your computer, but the way data is recorded and stored is different.
Periodically, a hard drive needs to be defragmented, in which the computer rearranges everything written on the surface of the drive for optimized performance. Since a solid-state drive doesn’t write to a disk, it doesn’t need to be defragmented. Solid state drives may be more expensive than hard drives, but they are becoming a more common way to store and deliver data. Many manufacturers use solid-state drive technology for smaller electronic devices, ruggedized computers, and some netbooks.
