The hard disk drive acts as the "data center" of the PC.

All the programs and data files are stored in HDD. Even with the emerge of optical storage, solid state drive (SSD), and flash memory, HDD still remain as the most important permanent storage used in PC.

 Platter

Spindle

Motor Actuator Read/Write Head Hard disk Logic Board

Platters are the disks inside the drive. Platters can vary in size. Often the size of the drive, 3.5" or 2.5", is based on the physical size of the platters. Most drives have two or more platters. The larger capacity drives have more platters. In the past, platters are usually made from aluminum alloy so that they are light. The newer drives make use of a new technology of glass/ceramic platters.

The spindle motor is responsible for spinning the platters. A spindle motor is typically a low-profile dc motor (similar in principle to the spindle motors used in floppydisk drives). They are set to spin the platters at a set rate, ranging from 5400 RPM to over 10000 RPM.

The head actuator is the device that all the heads are attached to. This part is in charge of moving the heads around the platters.

They read and write to the platters. There is usually one head per platter side, and each head is attached to a single actuator shaft so that all the heads move in unison. Each head is spring loaded to force it into the platter it reads. When off, each head rests on the platter surface.

Hard drives are controlled by a suite of remarkably sophisticated circuitry. The drive electronics board mounted below the chassis contains all of the circuitry necessary to communicate, control and signals with the particular physical interface.

Platter - The actual fixed disk within the hard disk drive. Generally there can be several platters within the hard disk drive. Tracks - Large sections that completely circle the platter. Sector - Section on the track. Cylinder - Tracks on each platter.

10

Hard disk capacity can be calculated based on :

The geometry parameter (for capacity 8.4GB and below)

HDD Capacity = Cylinders x Heads x Sectors x 512 Byte

= 13424 x 15 x 63 x 512 byte = 6,495,068,160 byte 6.4GB

11

For hard disk drive with capacity higher than 8.4GB, the LBA (Logical Block Addressing) value is used to indicate the capacity. HDD Capacity = LBA x 512 Byte

= 488397168 x 512 byte = 250,059,350,016 byte

250GB

12

Define how hard drives and other drives relate to the system. Types of Hard Drive Interfaces
IDE/EIDE Interface (internal) SATA Interface (internal) SCSI Interface (internal & external) USB (external) IEEE 1394 (external)

13

Advanced Technology Attachment (ATA) is the official name for the so-called IDE / EIDE / UDMA / ATAPI interface. IDE (Integrated Drive Electronic) is the earlier standard that supports up to 528MB only and later has been replaced by EIDE (Enhanced IDE).

14

15

16

17

A single 40-pin / 80-pin cable with three connectors on it. One of these connectors plugs into the IDE connector on the motherboard or I/O adapter card. The other two attach to the drives.

18

On one side of the 40-pin/80-pin IDE cable is a red line. This red line signifies pin 1. Connect the red line towards pin 1 or both hard disk and hard disk controllers. Most hard disks do not indicate which pin is pin 1. In this case, pin 1 is on the side close to the power connector.

19

Each IDE/EIDE controller can support up to two IDE disk drives. An IDE cable normally has three connectors which connect to
The IDE controller on the motherboard

The master disk drive

The slave disk drive

20

SATA (Serial Advanced Technology Attachment) is the new standard. SATA is faster than ATA (IDE) interface. Current SATA III (SATA 6Gb/s) has a transfer rate of 600MB/s while for ATA, the maximum is 133MB/s. Even with the earlier SATA I (SATA 1.5Gb/s) and SATA II (SATA 3Gb/s), the transfer rate is higher that ATA. The data cable as well as the power connector for SATA is different than ATA (see picture at the next slide). eSATA is the external version of SATA to provide connection to external hard disk.

21

22

23

SCSI (Small Computer System Interface) is popular in notebook computers and server computers. These require a SCSI Host adapter card connected into the system. These cards may be ISA, VLB or even PCI bus cards. Some computer manufacturers may have the SCSI port built onto the Motherboard. SCSI can connect to internal and external devices such as hard disk drive, CD-ROM drive, scanner.

24

SCSI Cable

SCSI HDD
25

IDE Hard Disk will have jumpers to allow it to be set as Master or Slave. By default, most hard disks that are purchased are configured to be master. If two hard disks are to be connected to a single IDE connector, then one of the hard disk will have to be set as slave. Note that you do not have to set master/slave for SATA hard disk because SATA HDD dont share the connection.

26

27

28

Use your fingers or a long nose pliers to remove and insert the jumper cap.

29

Turn off the PC. Touch the metal casing, this discharges any Static Electricity. Remove the case cover.

For IDE HDD, change the status of the HDD if necessary (i.e. master or slave). Consult their manuals to find out which jumpers change the HDD. Some drives also have this information stamped or stick onto them.
30

 Choose

the drive bay (3.5) you want to mount the HDD, insert the HDD carefully and apply the screws of the correct size and thread.
31

 Connect

the IDE cable (or SATA cable) and power connector to the drives and on-board IDE (SATA) connector. Make sure Pin-1 rule is followed (for IDE HDD).
32

Plug in your PC and switch it on. Be ready to enter the BIOS Setup utility as the PC's display starts up. Try to use the autodetect function of the BIOS to detect your newly installed HDD. If it cannot be detected, then you'll have to open up your PC again and check all the cable connections.

33

Boot into your operating system (i.e. Windows) and format the HDD. If you are installing the operating system at the same time, then most likely the setup process will format the HDD before installing the operating system.

34

Steps to prepare hard drive to hold files

Low-level format

Done at the factory Partitioning the hard drive Even if only one partition is being used High-level format Builds a files system for each logical drive OS creates an OS boot record, root directory, two copies of FAT for the logical drive

35

Low-level format is already done on your drive when you buy it. If you need to erase all traces of data on the disk, a low format will do this. It will also remap the drive so as to reallocate all bad sectors to other sectors. This replaces bad sectors with good ones. It will make your drive appear to be free of defects. This process is called defect mapping. A low-level format cannot be done with the FORMAT command. It is recommended to get the low-level format program from the manufacturer of your drive.

36

OS can divide a single physical drive into separate areas of storage. Each area, or division, is called a partition. Each partition acts as a separate logical drive with its own drive letter, although they all physically reside on the same drive. A partition table is used to record all the divisions in the master boot sector of the drive (1st sector). The primary partition is the partition which contains the necessary files for your system to boot. This means the partition is active and usually has the C: drive letter.

37

38

OS will provide tools to perform high-level format. It is required to prepare the hard disk to be used by the OS and all other programs. High-level format can be performed during OS installation process or explicitly done before the OS setup. Different OS may implement different types of file system : FAT, FAT32, NTFS FAT can only support partition size up to 2GB; FAT32 theoretically can supports up to 2TB but current implementation allows only 32GB; NTFS can support much bigger partition size (depend on the cluster size selected by user).
39

40

S.M.A.R.T. (Self-Monitoring, Analysis, and Reporting Technology) is a monitoring system for computer hard disks to detect and report on various indicators of reliability, in the hope of anticipating failures. The purpose of S.M.A.R.T. is to warn a user or system administrator of impending drive failure while there is still time to take preventative action, such as copying the data to a replacement device. Most motherboard and HDD nowadays support S.M.A.R.T.

41

42

The second physical hard drive is inaccessible after you install a 2nd IDE Hard Disk in your system. This is a classic sign of configuration problems. Check the drive jumper settings and make sure that the drive master/slave assignments are correct.

43

Unable to see full amount of hard drive. For example if a 6GB hard disk drive is installed in the computer it may only see 5.6GB. This is due to the different definition (manufacturer and OS) of hard disk size. Manufacturers define 1GB = 1,000,000,000 Bytes but software (Operating System) define 1GB = 1024 x 1024 x 1024 = 1,073,741,824 Bytes. So, a 6GB HDD is seen as 6,000,000,000/1,073,741,824 = 5.6GB in OS.

44

Unable to explore the content of a hard disk drive even though the drive letter is displayed by Windows. The partition (logical drive) is not yet formatted.

45

Unable to boot from the hard disk drive. This issue could be caused by any of the following possibilities :
The HDD is not set as one of the bootable options in the BIOS. The HDD has not been formatted.

The HDD does not contain the system files required to boot.
Master boot record or boot sector of the primary partition is

corrupted or missing.

46

Hard disk drive produces clicking sound while operating. The sound is most likely due to physical damage of the mechanical components of the HDD. It indicates that your HDD is failing. Backup your data and replace the HDD.

47

I'm getting Bad Sectors, Clusters and or Missing Allocations what should I do ? Certain sectors on the HDD is damage or unreliable to hold data. Backup data as soon as possible and prepare to replace the HDD.

48

Only able to see 2 Gig partition/drive. FAT (also known as FAT16) is used. The original release of Windows 95 and versions of Windows and MS-DOS released before it used a FAT16 partition table which allowed up to a 2 Gig partition. While larger hard disk drives could be used it required that you break the hard drive up to multiple sections.

49

Scandisk scans your hard drive for errors. This task should be done at least once a week. It is automatically launched when you do an improper shutdown on Windows 98.

Scandisk lets you know the condition of your hard drives and corrects most errors on it preventing problems later. If scandisk discovers any "bad sectors" your hard drive is on its way out.

50

51

Defrag puts all your files in proper order on the hard drive so that the computer can access them more efficiently and faster. It is like taking a shuffled deck of cards and putting all the cards in order by suits so that you can fine any card by name without much difficultly.

52

53