ISM 3004: Week 2: Muddy/ Hard Drives

After finishing all the homework videos, I found that it was very difficult to follow all of the abbreviations for the terms. Another "muddy" concept that was hard for me to grasp was in homework 2, when we discussed Hard Drives. The makeup of the Hard Drive consisting of platter, track, and sector confused me. After researching these three concepts it became very clear to me.

A platter is a circular disk in the Hard Drive where the magnetic data is stored. The track is where all the information is recorded in the Hard Drive. They consist of concentric circles placed on top of the platter. For example, it is similar to the annual rings of a tree. The tracks are numbered, starting on the outside of the platter at zero and increasing as you move inside. A hard disk could have tens of thousands of tracks on the platter. The sector is a subdivision of a track that holds a certain amount of data. Together all these work together to make up the Hard Drive.