There are many types of hard drives for computers on the market. And the choice of hard drive depends on which characteristics are more important to the consumer. The user should first of all pay attention to the main types and technology of drives, study the description of the types and rules for choosing computer hard drives.

Types of hard drives and features of their operation

There are only a few types of hard drives.

Therefore, you can easily understand them by delving a little into their features..

1. HDD. The device contains a set of magnetized metal disks that rotate on a spindle. Information is recorded using a mechanical head. This variety is the cheapest option. It is not shockproof; if it breaks, it is possible to restore data. The speed of reading and writing data compared to other types is in last place. When choosing a HDD, you should pay attention to the spindle rotation speed; the higher the value, the faster the disk responds to commands.
2. SSD. Solid state drives, unlike HDDs, do not contain moving components. SSD devices use semiconductors to store data. Such disks operate silently, faster (first place in operating speed), and they are also less likely to fail. At the same time, of course, they cost significantly more than HDDs. The main disadvantage is the impossibility of data recovery in case of disk failure.
3. H-HDD. This type of disk is used extremely rarely. This is a hybrid HDD with a solid state drive. By appearance This is an analogue of Hard Disk Drive.

The advantage over SSD is more memory at a lower cost.

The different types of hardware produced today depend primarily on the type of computers for which they are designed.

The main factors that determine the physical and technical characteristics hard drive are the amount of physically available space on the computer, the speed required for data transfer and the amount of disk space required. The hard drive types PATA, SATA, SCSI and SSD are the most commonly used in modern computers.

This is a type of parallel hard drive. These types of drives are also known as Integrated Drive Electronics (IDE) and Enhanced Integrated Drive Electronics (EIDE). The labels refer to the type of interface that is used to connect the drive to the CPU board. These drives use either a 40 or 80 conductor cable with a wide 40-pin connector. 40 conductor cables are used for older, slower hard drives, while 80 conductor cables are used for newer, faster drives.

Currently, PATA hard drives have been almost completely replaced by SATA hard drives.

This is a type of serial hard drive. These drives use a completely different connector than their PATA counterparts. They also use a different power adapter than IDE, although adapters are readily available. The main difference between SATA and PATA is that the former is thinner and supposedly has a faster data transfer interface than the latter. However, the speed of the PATA and SATA drives themselves are indistinguishable, and have the same RPM rating. But SATA drives are more efficient and consume less power.

Translated as "Small Computer System Interface". These hard drives are similar to IDE drives. They also spin at a higher speed compared to IDE, SATA, etc. IDE and SATA drives spin at 7200 rpm, while SCSI drives spin at 10,000 to 15,000 rpm. Today, SATA drives with a rotation speed of 10,000 rpm are also produced. The higher the rotation speed, the faster data is accessed, but this can also lead to rapid failure. SCSI hard drives require a controller that manages the interface between the drives and the computer's motherboard.

These hard drives, unlike other types, do not have moving components. Typical hard drives consist of a spinning magnetic disk that serves as data storage, while SSDs use semiconductors for this purpose. Because there are no moving components, these hard drives are much faster and less likely to break down than other drives. However, their price is slightly higher than other hard drives.

These were some types of hard drives that are commonly included in desktop computers and laptops. I hope you found this article helpful.

In the distant fifties of the last century, or more precisely in 1956, IBM created the great-great-great-grandfather of modern information storage. This miracle weighed a little more than a ton (!) and contained only 5 Megabytes of data. Such a “box” could only be lifted using a forklift.

As time passed, miniaturization replaced gigantomania. And now small “boxes” weighing a couple of hundred grams or even less can easily be placed in your system units, laptops, tablets and even phones, and recently in watches. It is believed that if aviation developed as rapidly as computers, today everyone could have a personal plane for more expensive than a car. But let's get back to the hardware.

When size matters

Miniaturization made it possible to create devices that fit in a matchbox and at the same time have fantastic capacity.

Among all the sizes of hard drives, three groups can be divided into three groups:

3.5 inches is the most common option, inhabiting almost every desktop PC;
- 2.5 inches - a brother in the information department, but for laptops;
- 1–1.5 inches – usually installed on smartphones, MP3 players and similar devices.

But even despite its size, today a 1-inch “baby” is capable of storing hundreds of tracks of your favorite music and dozens of films.

His Majesty is the controller

If, upon opening the system unit, you find connectors that are not at all what you expected, there is a reason for this. Each controller has its own characteristics.

Hard drives differ in the connection method, as well as the principle of operation:

IDE is the most common disk controller that used to be used. Nowadays it is not used so often. It allowed the disc rotation speed to reach 7.5 thousand revolutions per minute, which gave good performance.
- SATA (I, II, III) – the next generation after IDE. With the best rotation speed, up to 10 thousand revolutions per minute.
- SCSI has always stood somewhat apart, since it was not accessible to ordinary mortals. It was distinguished by its reading speed (up to 15 thousand revolutions), so it was and is still used where special performance is needed.
- SDD is a hard disk controller designed based on the principle of flash memory. Contains no moving parts, everything inside is replaced with electronic components. Thanks to this, it offers high indicators on mean time between failures (up to 1 million hours) and reading. However, today they are still expensive. As an alternative, there is a hybrid version with flash memory and a mechanical part.

Outside or inside?

You can point out one more feature of a hard drive - the way it is placed. There are internal and external models.

The internal ones are quietly placed in the system unit, smartphone, and their work is visible only by the blinking of the lights outside.

External hard drives are small boxes with cords. They connect to a USB port and work great. If you take such a box and disassemble it, then the same ordinary 2-5 or 3-5 inch HDD or SDD will appear.

What next?

Progress differs in one very useful property. He doesn't stand still. Methods for storing information using lasers, crystals, and holographic images are already being developed. Various materials are being tested and innovative devices are being created. Perhaps, soon the hard drives we are familiar with will give way to a miracle that has come down to us from the pages of books in the Sci-Fi genre.

Today, on the computer components market, hard drives are represented by two main types - SDD and HDD. Which one is better? Let's look at this issue in detail.

HDD – classic hard drive

HDD is a classic hard drive, which is a box containing round magnetic plates and read heads. Data is stored on magnetic plates, and read heads, accordingly, read this data. The principle of operation of an HDD is similar to a gramophone, except that the spindle speed is much faster. The HDD spindle spins magnetized plates at speeds of 5400 and 7200 rpm. These are the most common spindle speeds for HDDs intended for consumer computers. The spindle rotation speed can be much higher - for example, 10,000 or more revolutions per minute, but these are already server equipment standards.

HDD inside / forumrostov.ru

What does the HDD spindle rotation speed give? This indicator often measures the speed of reading and writing data by a hard drive - than more speed spindle rotation, the faster the speed of reading and writing data. But this is not entirely true, since the performance of the HDD is also affected by its other indicators - recording density and random access time.

The higher the recording density, the faster the HDD will be. The recording density of modern HDDs is 100-150 GB/sq.in. With the random access indicator, the opposite is true, because this is the time during which the hard drive will read or write data on any part of the magnetic plate. Therefore, the shorter this time, the better. The range of this parameter is usually from 2.5 to 16 ms.

Thus, in computer operation, the difference between two HDDs with a spindle speed of 5400 and 7200 may not be noticeable.

HDDs also differ in physical dimensions and technical specifications models are designated according to their width. This size is 3.5 inches - the standard HDD size for PC assembly - and 2.5 inches - the HDD size for laptops.

SSD – new format hard drive

SSD– in the technical characteristics of computer devices you can also find its other name “solid-state drive” - in fact, it is a voluminous flash drive with enormous data reading and writing speeds compared to HDDs. SSD is 3-4 times faster than HDD. It will take no more than 10 seconds to fully load Windows installed on an SSD, while this operating system It will take about two minutes to load onto the HDD.

What is the secret to SSD performance? HDD, for example, when Windows startup spends time searching for sectors on the magnetic plate and moving the read heads. Exactly the same on startup Windows versions with exactly the same functionality on startup, the SSD simply reads data from the specific block of the matrix where this data is located. The operating system, programs, and individual files launch faster on an SSD drive.

SSD inside / fotkidepo.ru

SSDs do not add much weight to laptops, because they weigh no more than 100 g. While a 2.5-inch HDD weighing 700-800 g clearly will not make it easier to carry the device on a daily basis.

Unlike HDDs, SSDs are not susceptible to shocks or falls. But if you accidentally drop your laptop, you can add to the hassle of replacing the HDD and restoring data.

SSDs operate silently, while a good high-speed HDD can even interfere with sleep if the computer is left turned on at night.

By the way, about data recovery, in this matter the SSD loses to the HDD. Recovering data from an SSD is problematic. If, for example, there is a power surge, the SSD will burn out completely and all data will be destroyed. But in an HDD in exactly the same case, only a small board will burn out, while all the data will remain on the magnetic plates. If desired, IT specialists can restore this data. The same applies to restoring data previously deleted by the user using a special software. On most SSD drives, it will not be possible to recover deleted files after emptying the Recycle Bin. But SSD manufacturers are already working on this issue; moreover, some models of solid-state drives may not physically clear the matrix blocks from the recorded data at the time the user command is received, but do it later, when it becomes necessary.

But this is far from the most vulnerable point of solid-state drives. Their disadvantages are as significant as their advantages over HDDs.

Firstly, this is the price. SSD is very expensive. For the price of a 60 GB SSD, you can buy a good HDD with 1 TB of disk space.

Secondly, it is a small volume - an SSD with a capacity of 512 MB is quite rare in the computer components market; much more common standards are volumes of 128 GB or 60 GB. As we can see, such arrangements do not make an SSD a full-fledged device for the user’s needs, and if we are not talking about an ultra-thin ultrabook, a laptop or PC will still have to be equipped with an HDD for file storage. Using only an SSD for data storage, we repeat, can result in a decent amount of money.

Thirdly, SSDs have a clearly defined service life. You can rewrite data on an SSD up to 10,000 times. HDDs do not have such restrictions, and it is rare that users change a hard drive for this very reason. As a rule, this is either mechanical damage, overheating, or modernization. Given the high cost of SSDs, the computer device must be equipped with at least 8 GB of RAM to be able to disable the Windows page file. After all, constantly overwriting the data in this file will help the SSD resource run out faster.

SSD or HDD: which is better to choose?

Which is better HDD or SSD? Subject to availability Money Of course, an SSD as part of a PC build or in a laptop won’t hurt. Despite all the technical shortcomings of a solid-state drive, it is beneficial for using it as a system partition for Windows. If your income is not yet particularly conducive to serious spending, a good high-speed HDD is a much more practical option.

Photo on the main page: HDD hard drive next to an SSD drive / 123rf.com