A hard disk drive (HDD), commonly referred to as a hard drive or hard disk, is a non-volatile storage device which stores digitally encoded data on rapidly rotating platters with magnetic surfaces.
Early hard drive had removable media, however, an hard drive today is typically sealed unit with fixed media.
Today there are three types of HDD available in the market.
- IDE HDD
- SATA HDD
- SCSI HDD
The biggest difference between these three types of HDD is the speed. SCSI is the faster as compared to SATA AND IDE, but it is not used so much because it is really complicated to install and it is only used in servers. SATA is the one which is used the most. It can be used in desktops and it is simple to install.
The hard disk drive is constructed using the following elements:
- Disk platter
- Read/write head
- Head Arm/head slider
- Head Actuator mechanism
- Spindle motor
- Logic board
- Air filter
- Bezel
- Cable and IDE Connectors
