What are the importance of data storage of a computer?

Answer 1

In a sense it is not. However, before long-term storage was invented for computers, systems which contained data would lose that data if the system was ever turned off. It could also be lost in a power flicker, brownout, power spike, or in the event of errors or data corruption, which happened frequently.

Long-term storage was needed to store data when the system was turned off. And for computers not in constant use, this could also allow the system to be purposely turned off, and save (a lot of) power.

The first media used for computer storage were Punchcards and Punchtape. These were cards or reels of paper with holes punched in them. A light shines through the holes and is read back by a simple optical reader to identify individual bits. Most punchards held only up to 500 bits (about 58 useable bytes), while punchtape could be much longer. Computers could easily be programmed to create their own punchcards and punctape, provided they were inserted JUST right. This didn't exist at first but once it did, it allowed you to program or type up data, then have it spit out in an immediately useable manner. Before this, you can to punch the data yourself- A very difficult and complex process.

Later, the advent of other media, especially magnetic storage, improved the process. Using Drum Memory, computers finally had access to enormous amounts of storage at much higher speeds than punch drives. These drums could hold several kilobytes or more, and operated on large rotating cylinders read back with a servo. It also allowed the computer to use the drum drive for temporary (memory) storage, in the event it ran out, vastly increasing it's calculatory capabilities.

Later, magnetic tape was invented. It was not random-access like drum drives, but was far more compact and efficient, held much more data, and was cheap and affordable to manufacture. Tape Drives are still in use today for massive-scale backups, ranging from several hundreds megabyte nanocasettes to enormous 45 TB tapes. While it was slower than drum drives, it was vastly superior to tape drives and held many hundreds to thousands of times more data. For a time, before the floppy disk, it was the storage media of choice. Many people remember the Commodore 64, a tape-drive powered personal computer console gaming system.

Later, the advent of harddrives, which used spinning platters instead of drums, allowed the computer long-term storage internally. It was much faster than tape drives, although it's capacity was more limited. It also allowed non-sequential access, so it could go to and load a file specifically.

THe floppy drive also provided a better method of data storage for external use. Since Hard Drives were fragile and internally mounted, they could not easily be transported, and were expensive. So floppy drives used a thin 'floppy' plastic disc that held a magnetic powder inside. Like a cross between a harddrive and a tape drive, it was inexpensive, relatively reliable, and fast enough (though harddrives were much faster) to outperform tape drives. Floppy drives became standardized first with 5.25" disks, which added a large, soft plastic cover. Then the 3.5" floppy diskette which had a hard plastic case, no longer 'floppy' at all except the film inside, a moveable metal plate to protect the film from dust, debris, and scratches. And an optical sensor 'read only' tab that provided (poor) protection against piracy, and prevented accidental overwrite of a floppy.

Eventually harddrives became the dominant platform for internal storage, but many years later the floppy was finally replaced by the CD. Using optical (visual) storage methods instead of magnetic, it could hold a lot of data in a small area, read sequentially, and was generally faster than a floppy. While floppies evolved into faster and much larger Zip Drives, the rewriteable CD (or CD-R, or CD Burner) was vastly superior due to being a bit faster, a lot cheaper, and more reliable and universal. Everyone had a CD-ROM drive already, but not many had Zip Drives. CD Burners could produce CDs that work on normal CD-ROM drives. Thus is became the superior media.

CDs evolved into DVDs, which evolved into Blu-Ray and HD-DVDs (now defunct)

Other storage media soon was invented. The advent of SD cards, NAND drives, thumb drives, magneto-optical disks, SRAM sticks, Flash drives, Solid State Drives, and more all contributed to storage. Each with their own advantages and disadvantages. I won't ellaborate on these unless you ask.

So, as you can see, for MODERN computing, without storage, you could simply not function. You would have to spend many hours or even days typing in code to you computer, just to build an Operating System, and getting it to boot.

All that, just to BOOT! But with storage, you can just re-load the pre-existing data off your storage device automatically. And voila! Instant working computer.

Answer 2

So you can use it.

Anything you do on your computer if it is checking email or using Microsoft Word, it all Save needs storage. You need a web browser witch uses memory when checking email or if you save a Word document. Plus many items are becoming digital so the files needed are going Up and Up and Up.

Answer 3

Without storage a computer is useless. You would not be able to store any of your personal files, documents, photos etc. You would not be able to browse the internet or anything else as browsers themselves take up storage space.

Answer 4

Storage is where we keep the documents we create in Word, Excel and other applications. We also need to store incoming documents, pictures from other people and the like.

Answer 5

Your DATA will save

Answer 6

floopy disk