How do computer hard drives function?

Answer 1

A hard disk is a device that is used to store large amounts of data in a computer system. Hard disks differ from other memory because they are non-volatile; they retain the data even when they do not have power.

The data, which can be either just informational data, or executable programs, is written onto a spinning disk by making magnetic pulses very near the surface of the disk which make magnetized spots on the disk. The data is comprised of places which either are, or are not magnetized, yielding ones or zeros. The coils which make the magnetic field are on movable structures which "fly" above the disk, in that they are spring loaded to force them toward the spinning disk, but since actual contact would destroy both the coil and the disk, the structure is shaped like an airfoil (airplane wing), so that the relative wind from the spinning disk forces the coil structure just a small distance away from the disk.

Answer 2

Hard drives work by using magnetism to encode data onto the platters, so the only way to totally erase something on a hard drive would be to place it in the presence of a strong magnetic field

Hard drives work by spinning a disk and moving several arms across the surface to read and write from the surface of the disk

Hard drives work by circular platters moving past a stationary read/write arm

Hard drives work by sending a strong electro-magnetic pulse at a very focused, high density gain of rust on a spinning platter

Hard drives work by storing information on circular discs (platters), which are read by tiny electro-magnetic "heads"

Hard drives work by levitating a head a very small distance from the media; unlike floppy or tape, where the media actually touches the head

Hybrid hard drives work by using the flash memory as a sort of write cache

In the Hard Drives & Disks section, we explore how they work, what it means when your hard drive crashes and how to add a hard drive to your computer

Answer 3

A hard drive has one or more platters, or disks, that stack together and spin in unison inside a sealed metal housing that contains firmware to control the reading and writing data to the drive and to communicate with the motherboard. Each disk is coated with a magnetic medium that holds data as magnetized spots.

Answer 4

The hard disk is covered in millions of tiny rods which can be read as 1 or 0 by a magnetic head depending on whether they are upside down or the right way up. Different sequences of bits (1s or 0s) are called bytes, and each byte means something different.

Answer 5

One of the most necessary parts of a computer is the hard drive. Besides storing digital information, hard disk drives also contain all of a computer's operating data, including the operating system. In configurations with multiple hard drives, they are also useful in backing up data for archival purposes.

Answer 6

Overall, a secondary hard drive works the same as a primary hard drive. In the case of PATA drives, the secondary hard drive operates as a "slave" drive. It disables its controller and lets the primary hard drive control it. This is determined by jumper settings on both drives and/or the cable position.

While SATA drives are modeled after PATA drives, SATA drives operate on independent channels, and thus every SATA drive is a "master" drive. Their order or addressing are all dependent upon which socket they are plugged into.

Answer 7

A traditional hard disk works with electromagnetism.

It uses a writing/reading arm with a electromagnet that will write/read data as magnetic fields onto platter(s).