View Source: HardDisk - Waikato Linux Users Group

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The piece of [Hardware] that stores your programs and data "permanently" - ie after the power goes off. You probably know what a hard disk is.

Hard drives used to have capacity measured in MegaByte~s -- these days it's in GigaByte~s (but also see the MebiByte and GibiByte pages).

A typical cheap [IDE] hard disk drive these days might cost around NZ$120 for 40-80 GigaByte~s  of data (about $1/Gb for larger drives). [SCSI] drives are typically slightly more expensive.

The standard method of measuring large amounts of data (in the mainstream media) appears to be ''[LibraryOfCongress|LOC]'' x ''n''.

To appreciate how far storage technology has come, look at the size of [a 4 megabyte disk platter | http://www.wlug.org.nz/archive/images/platter-lowres.jpg?] used at StanfordUniversity in the 1960s; there a $1 note in the lower-right corner to give you an idea of the platter's size. The black mark around it is from a disk head crash (!!).

See also:
* PartitioningSuggestions
* BackupNotes
* FileSystems
* Category:DiskNotes

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Part of CategoryHardware

45 pages link to HardDisk:

Last edited on Sunday, May 1, 2005 1:42:52 pm by JasonDrake

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