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Everything You Want to Know About Hard Drives.
Understanding hard drive basics will help you make better storage decisions.What's a Hard Drive Do?
A hard drive is the hardware component that stores all of your digital content. Your documents, pictures, music, videos, programs, application preferences, and operating system represent digital content stored on a hard drive. Hard drives can be external or internal.
Everything stored on a hard drive is measured in terms of its file size. Documents (text) are generally very small whereas pictures are large, music is even larger, and videos are by far the biggest. A hard drive determines the size of digital files in terms of megabytes (MB), gigabytes (GB), and terabytes (TB).
There are 3 major versions of hard drive technologies. All of them have pros and cons and reasons for owning each versions;
Standard Hard Drives
- This is an older technology but has continued to evolve in speed and reliability. Basically the technology is like a record player except the platters are metal instead of vinyl and the needle is magnetic allowing you to read, write and erase. The faster the hard drive spins, or RPM, the faster the read and write happens.
Pros -- Cheapest per GB, very reliable and easily replaceable.
Cons -- Much slower than newer technologies.
Solid State or SSD Drives
- Solid State is basically a form of memory that can be written to and the data will stay saved even with the power off!
Pros -- Very Fast read/write, no moving parts so it is quiet and in theory should last longer, less heat and energy.
Cons -- Price per GB is more expensive than Standard HDD.
M.2 Drives
- An M.2 SSD is a solid-state drive (SSD) that conforms to a computer industry specification written for internally mounted storage expansion cards of a small form factor. Shaped like a stick of gum. Most M.2 SSDs are 80 x 22mm (L x W), but they can be shorter or longer. You can tell what size an M.2 SSD is by reading the four or five-digit number in its name: the first two numbers are its width, while the others are its length (example: M.2 Type-2280).
Pros -- Small for factor and SPEED,!!! M.2 card can use either the existing SATA 3.0 specifications and be restricted to the 600MB/s or it could instead elect to use PCI-Express that provides a bandwidth of 1GB/s under the current PCI-Express 3.0 standards.
Cons -- Compatibility, since this is an internal storage device your motherboard must be newer and include the proper slot(s) to accommodate this storage technology.
Hybrid Hard Drives
- A Hybrid Hard Drive may be the best of both worlds. In a Hybrid Drive you have both SSD and Platter or Standard Hard Drives included in one device. Typically you have a smaller SSD Drive coupled with a larger HDD. You have the low price per GB of an HDD and the speed of an SSD. This type of drive is a great choice for SMB workstations all the way to gaming machines.
Pros -- Best overall value for the dollar as well as speed ratio.
Cons -- Can add a level of complexity to some users as you basically have 2 drives in one and will have to be aware of what drive you will save data vs programs to.
If you have an older Computer or notebook consider the SSD option as it will make your system feel new again with this faster storage technology.
Internal vs. External or Portable Hard Drives
External desktop hard drives are built using a drive and require an AC adapter plugged into a power outlet. These drives are a good choice for supplementing a desktop computer or plugging into a laptop's home base, and typically can extend your need to upgrade your hard drive or more importantly it can be used as a backup drive. As the saying goes "It's not if, but when something fails!" Please Backup...CompSource wants this to be as easy and stress-free as possible.
We're here to help you decide. Chat with us or give our professionals a quick phone call (800)-413-7361, we can assist with the best solution for your needs and budget.
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