Lesson 4: Storage

The purpose of storage in a computer is to hold data or information and get that data to the CPU as quickly as possible when it is needed. Computers use disks for storage: hard disks that are located inside the computer, and floppy or compact disks that are used externally.

Hard Disks

Your computer uses two types of memory: primary memory which is stored on chips located on the motherboard, and secondary memory that is stored in the hard drive. Primary memory holds all of the essential memory that tells your computer how to be a computer. Secondary memory holds the information that you store in the computer.
Inside the hard disk drive case you will find circular disks that are made from polished steel. On the disks, there are many tracks or cylinders. Within the hard drive, an electronic reading/writing device called the head passes back and forth over the cylinders, reading information from the disk or writing information to it. Hard drives spin at 3600 or more rpm (Revolutions Per Minute) - that means that in one minute, the hard drive spins around over 3600 times!
Today's hard drives can hold a great deal of information - sometimes over 20GB!

Floppy Disks

When you look at a floppy disk, you'll see a plastic case that measures 3 1/2 by5 inches. Inside that case is a very thin piece of plastic (see picture at right) that is coated with microscopic iron particles. This disk is much like the tape inside a video or audio cassette. Take a look at the floppy disk pictured. At one end of it is a small metal cover with a rectangular hole in it. That cover can be moved aside to show the flexible disk inside. But never touch the inner disk - you could damage the data that is stored on it. On one side of the floppy disk is a place for a label. On the other side is a silver circle with two holes in it. When the disk is inserted into the disk drive, the drive hooks into those holes to spin the circle. This causes the disk inside to spin at about 300 rpm! At the same time, the silver metal cover on the end is pushed aside so that the head in the disk drive can read and write to the disk.
Floppy disks are the smallest type of storage, holding only 1.44MB.

Thumb or Jump Drive, Flash Drive, Or USB Drive (stick) [Wikipedia]

Called by many names, a flash drive consists of a small printed circuit board protected inside a plastic, metal, or rubberised case, robust enough for carrying with no additional protection — in a pocket or on a key chain, for example. The USB connector is protected by a removable cap or by retracting into the body of the drive, although it is not liable to be damaged if exposed. Most flash drives use a standard type-A USB connection allowing plugging into a port on a personal computer.

Personal data transport: The most common use of flash drives is to transport and store personal files such as documents, pictures and videos. Individuals also store medical alert information on MedicTag flash drives for use in emergencies and for disaster preparation.

Secure storage of data, application and software files: With wide deployment(s) of flash drives being used in various environments (secured or otherwise), the issue of data and information security remains of the utmost importance. The use of biometrics and encryption is becoming the norm with the need for increased security for data. In some cases a Secure USB Drive may use a hardware-based encryption mechanism that uses a hardware module instead of software for strongly encrypting data.

Flash drives also store data relatively densely compared to many removable media. In mid-2008, 64 GB drives became available, with the ability to hold many times more data than a DVD.

Compared to hard drives, flash drives use little power, have no fragile moving parts, and for low capacities are small and light.

Most modern operating systems can read and write to flash drives without installing device drivers.

Disadvantages: Like all flash memory devices, flash drives can sustain only a limited number of write and erase cycles before failure. This should be a consideration when using a flash drive to run application software or an operating system.

Most USB flash drives do not include a write-protect mechanism, although some have a switch on the housing of the drive itself to keep the host computer from writing or modifying data on the drive. Write-protection makes a device suitable for repairing virus-contaminated host computers without risk of infecting the USB flash drive itself.

A drawback to the small size is that they are easily misplaced, left behind, or otherwise lost.

How Hard and Floppy Disks Work

The process of reading and writing to a hard or floppy disk is done with electricity and magnetism. The surfaces of both types of disks can be easily magnetized. The electromagnetic head of the disk drive records information to the disk by creating a pattern of magnetized and non-magnetized areas on the disk's surface. Do you remember how the binary code uses on and off commands to represent information? On the disk, magnetized areas are on and non-magnetized areas are off, so that all information is stored in binary code. This is how the electronic head can both write to or read from the disk surface.
It is very important to always keep magnets away from floppy disks and away from your computer! The magnets can erase information from the disks!

Compact Disks

Instead of electromagnetism, CDs use pits (microscopic indentations) and lands (flat surfaces) to store information much the same way floppies and hard disks use magnetic and non-magnetic storage. Inside the CD-Rom is a laser that reflects light off of the surface of the disk to an electric eye. The pattern of reflected light (pit) and no reflected light (land) creates a code that represents data.
CDs usually store about 650MB. This is quite a bit more than the 1.44MB that a floppy disk stores. A DVD or Digital Video Disk holds even more information than a CD, because the DVD can store information on two levels, in smaller pits or sometimes on both sides.

Uses of Floppy Disks

You might wonder: If all the information is stored safely inside my computer, why would I need to store it outside? There are several reasons why portable storage is so important.
Floppies make it possible to backup important information in case it is lost by the computer. Do you remember in Lesson 2, we talked about RAM and ROM? RAM loses its memory each time the computer is turned off, but ROM keeps information stored even when the computer is not turned on. Well, sometimes computers have problems that can cause them to crash. No, that doesn't mean they jump off the desk and smash on the floor ;-). A crash is something that happens inside the computer's circuits and can make it forget things. Some crashes can even make ROM forget everything! Having important information backed up on disks will allow you to put it back into your computer's memory. Backup disks can save you lots of time and headaches!
Disks also allow information to be transferred between different computers. Let's say that you are working on a project using a computer at the library, but you don't finish it by closing time. There's your project sitting in the computer. How do you get it home to finish it on your computer? You write the information to a disk, take it home and upload the information into your computer from the disk. What an easy way to transfer information!

Uses of Compact Disks

The most common use for compact disks (aside from playing music) is storage of software programs. When you purchase a computer game, the program that tells your computer how to run the game is stored on a CD. You move the program into your computer's memory by installing it. Some programs are transferred completely into your computer's hard drive. However, many programs are very large and would take up lots of memory space on your hard drive. To keep that from happening, these programs are designed to only upload part of the program onto your computer. The rest of the program stays on the software. The program cannot be run from your computer unless you have the CD in the disk drive so that RAM can read the rest of the program from it.
With the introduction of CD-RW (disk drives that can write to compact disks as well as read from them), CDs can now be used for storage much like floppies. Using a CD-RW, computer data can be backed up to a CD. All kinds of information that was too large to fit on floppy disks can now be saved on CD. Many people store music files or family photos on CD.

Lesson 4 - Vocabulary

Instructions: Type the words in a Word document, in the order given. Include appropriate school heading. Definitions can be found at the site below, if not, use your lesson material to write a definition.
Definition site

There are NO definitions for this lesson BUT we will have a combined, Lesson 1- Lesson 4, spelling/acronym test.

Words to know:

Complete the 2 worksheets when you finish your reading.

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