Jimma Institute of Technology

Faculty of Informatics and

Computing

Course Title: Computer Maintenance and

Technical Support

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 Chapter 6
Storage Devices

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 Objective

After completing this chapter you will be able to

• Define Secondary Storage Devices.

• Recognize Floppy Disk and Floppy Disk Drive.

• Identify components of hard drive

• Understand how hard drives work

• Recognize CD/DVD(Optical disks) and CD/DVD Drive.

• Identify the difference b/n Hard Disk Drive and SSD.

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Storage Devices

• A storage device is any hardware capable of holding information so

storage in computers is the process of retaining information for future
use.

• Without a storage device, your computer would not be able to save

any settings or information.
 Floppy diskette
 Hard drive
 CD-ROM disc, CD-R and CD-RW disc (Optical disks)
 Cloud Storage
 USB flash drive
 Memory card
 Tape cassette
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Floppy disk

Floppy disk(diskette):

Magnetic storage medium used with computers.

Floppy disks are made of flexible plastic coated with a magnetic material, and are
enclosed in a hard plastic case.

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Floppy disk…

 3 1/2 inch: -can store 1.44MB of data

 5 1/4 inch: -can store 1.2MB of data

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Hard Disk Drive

• Hard disk is one of the core components of any computers and it can
contain huge amount of data.

• The hard drive consists of one or more hard drive platters (hard
disks) inside of an air sealed casing to protect it from dust.

• Because the hard disk drive is expected to retain data until deliberately
erased or overwritten, the hard drive is used to store crucial
programming and data.

• Most computer hard drives are located in an internal drive bay at the
front of the computer

• They connect to the motherboard using both an ATA, SCSI, or SATA

cable and power cable.

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Basic Components of hard disk

• A hard disk is comprised of four basic parts:

• platters (disks),
• a spindle,
• read/write heads, and
• integrated electronics.

 The head actuator,

 read/write actuator arm,

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• Platters are rigid disks made of
metal or plastic.
• Both sides of each platter are
covered with an extremely thin
coating of iron oxide or other
magnetizable material.
• The platters are mounted on a
central axle or spindle, which
rotates all the platters at the
same speed.

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• Read/write heads are mounted on head arms that extend over both top
and bottom surfaces of each disk.

• The arms jointly move back and forth between the platters’ centers and
outside edges; this movement, along with the platters’ rotation, allow the
read/write heads to access all areas of the platters.

• The integrated electronics translate commands from the computer and

move the read/write heads to specific areas of the platters, thus
reading and/or writing the needed data.

• The head actuator is the device used to position the head arms
to different tracks on the surface of the platter.

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Tracks and Sectors

• Platters are organized into specific

structures to enable the organized
storage and retrieval of data.

• Each platter is broken into tracks-

tens of thousands of them - which
are tightly-packed concentric circles.

• Each track is further broken down

into sectors.

• A sector is normally the

smallest individually
addressable unit of information
stored on a hard disk, and
normally holds 512 bytes of
information.
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How Is Data Stored and Retrieved?

• When a computer saves data, it sends the data to the hard disk as
a series of bits( 0s and 1s).

• As the disk receives the bits, it uses the read/write heads to

magnetically record or “write” the bits as a magnetic charge on the
oxide coating of a disk platter.

• NB: Data bits are not necessarily(but it is possible) stored in succession;

For example, the data in one file may be written to several different
areas on different platters.

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How Is Data Stored and Retrieved?

• When the computer requests data stored on the disk, the platters
rotate and the read/write heads move back and forth to the specified
data areas.

• The read/write heads read the data by determining the magnetic field of
each bit, positive or negative, and then reply that information back to
the computer.

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Disk Formatting

• It’s most basic form of disk organization.

• Formatting prepares the hard disk so that files can be written to the

platters and then quickly retrieved when needed.

• Hard disks must be formatted in two ways: physically and logically

• A hard disk’s physical formatting (also called low-level formatting) is

usually performed by the manufacturer. (means when they are built)

• Physical formatting divides the hard disk’s platters into their basic
physical elements: tracks, sectors, and cylinders
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Disk Formatting

• The tracks are identified by number, starting with track zero at the
outer
edge.

• A cylinder is comprised of a set of tracks that lie at the same

distance from the spindle on all sides of all the platters.

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• Computer hardware and software frequently work using cylinders.

• Bad sectors are the sectors that can no longer be used to hold data due

to gradual deterioration of magnetic properties of the platter coating.

• Consequently, it becomes more and more difficult for the read/write

heads to read data from or write data to the affected platter sectors.

• Most modern computers can determine when a sector is bad; if this

happens, the computer simply marks the sector as bad (so it will
never be used) and then uses an alternate sector.

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Logical Formatting

• After a hard disk has been physically formatted, it must also be logically

formatted.

• Logical formatting places a file system on the disk, allowing an operating

system (such as DOS, OS/2, Windows, or Linux) to use the available
disk space to store and retrieve files.

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Understanding Partitions

• After a disk has been physically formatted, it can be divided into

separate
physical sections or partitions.

• Each partition functions as an individual unit, and can be

logically formatted with any desired file system.

• Once a disk partition has been logically formatted, it is referred

to as a
volume.

• As part of the formatting operation, you are asked to give the partition
a name, called the “volume label.”

– Example Local Disk C, D or F

• This name helps you easily identify the volume

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Why Use Multiple Partitions?

• Install more than one OS on your hard disk;

• Make the most efficient use of your available disk space;

• Make your files as secure as possible;

• Physically separate data so that it is easy to find files and back up data.

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Partition types

• There are three kinds of partitions:

primary, extended, and logical.

• Primary and extended partitions are the

main disk divisions;

• One hard disk may contain up to four

primary partitions, or three primary
partitions and one extended partition.

• The extended partition can then be

further divided into any number of
logical partitions

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Primary partition

• A primary partition may contain an operating system along with any

number of data files (for example, program files or user files). Before
an OS is installed,
• The primary partition must be logically formatted with a file
system compatible to the OS.
• If you have multiple primary partitions on your hard disk, only one
primary
partition may be visible and active at a time.
• The active partition is the partition from which an OS is booted
at computer startup.
• Primary partitions other than the active partition are hidden,
preventing
their data from being accessed.
• Thus, the data in a primary partition can be accessed (for all
practical purposes) only by the OS installed on that partition.
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Extended partition

• The extended partition was invented as a way of getting around the

arbitrary four-partition limit.

• An extended partition is essentially a container in which you can

further physically divide your disk space by creating an unlimited
number of logical partitions.

• An extended partition does not directly hold data. You must create
logical partitions within the extended partition in order to store data.

• Once created, logical partitions must be logically formatted, but each

can
use a different file system.

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 Logical partitions

• Logical partitions can exist only within an extended partition and

are meant to contain only data files and OSs that can be booted
from a logical partition (OS/2, Linux, and Windows NT)

• You can access logical partition files from multiple OSs

• A logical partition is what

you can create to store
things like movies,
software, application files,
and more.

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Managing Partitions

• Shrinking volume

• Extending volume

• Creating partition

• Deleting volume

• Hiding volume

• Making primary part as

active

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• When you create multiple primary partitions to hold different operating
systems, you must tell the computer which primary partition to boot
from.

• The primary partition from which the computer boots is called the
active partition.

• If there is no active primary partition on the physical hard disk,

your computer will not be able to boot from your hard disk.

• WARNING! Before you make a primary partition active, make sure that it
is a bootable partition.

• Bootable partitions are logically formatted and have the necessary

OS files installed.

• Partitions without an OS cannot be booted.

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Head Crashes

• Read/write heads of a hard disk are floating on a microscopic layer of air

above the disk platters.

• Normally, the heads only contact the surface when the drive is either
starting up or stopping.

• It is possible that the heads can make contact with the media

• Head crash is a condition where the heads contact the surface of the
disk while it is at operational speed.

• The most common causes of head crashes are contamination getting

stuck in the thin gap between the head and the disk, and shock applied
to the hard disk while it is in operation.

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Hard disk drives Vs Solid state drives

• Solid state drives (SSDs) do not have moving parts, which results
in
faster access to data, higher reliability, and reduced power usage.

• It uses flash memory to store data

• SSDs can replace HDD soon

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Optical Disks

Use laser light to read or write data

DVD, CD
CD (compact disc)
Can store up to 700 MB
Three types
CD-ROM( compact disk read only memory)
You can’t write to or erase
CD-R (compact disk recordable)
Can be written on once but can’t be erased-WORM (write once read
many)
CD-RW –(compact disk rewritable)
Can write several times
Can be erased
DVD- Digital Versatile Disc
Can store 4GB, 8GB
More recent drives can read Blu-ray discs and write to BD-R (Blu-ray disc
recordable) discs, and these drives are often called BD-ROM or Blu-ray drives.
provide 28 GB of space to store data.

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CD-ROM

• CD-ROM drives have speeds ranging from 1x all the way up to

72x,
meaning it reads the CD roughly 72 times faster than the 1x version.

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Top CD-ROM Drive Problems and solutions

• Problem: Cannot read information on a CD or DVD.

 Check all the cables, monitor, keyboard and mouse functionality.

 Remove the disk and try to clean it with a commercial cleaning fluid
or a clean damp cloth.
 Try to clean the disk drive with a disk cleaning CD or DVD.

• Problem: Disc drive not working in Windows

 Make sure you have tested more than one CD in the disc drive it
may be one CD that is bad or dirty.
 Check Device Manager: Within Device Manager verify that the
CDROM has no exclamation marks or red Xs
 Corruption in Windows: Try testing the CDROM in Safe Mode.

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