seek time

Seek time is one of the three delays associated with reading or writing data on a computer's disk drive, and somewhat similar for CD or DVD drives. The others are rotational delay and transfer time. In order to read or write data in a particular place on the disk, the read/write head of the disk needs to be physically moved to the correct place. This process is known as seeking, and the time it takes for the head to move to the right place is the seek time. Seek time for a given disk varies depending on how far the head's destination is from its origin at the time of each read or write instruction; usually one discusses a disk's average seek time.

Solid State Disks (SSDs) do not have a seek time because data is accessed without the use of moving parts.

See also

• Rotational delay
• Access time
• Hard disk

References

• Charles M. Kozierok (2001-04-17). "The PC Guide: Seek Time". http://www.pcguide.com/ref/hdd/perf/perf/spec/posSeek-c.html. Retrieved 2007-09-09. 
• SPARC Product Directory. "War of the Disks: Hard Disk Drives vs. Flash Solid State Disks". http://www.storagesearch.com/bitmicro-art3.html. Retrieved 2009-05-11.