HDD Basic

This category introduce the basic knowledge about hard drive, file system, hard drive
components, basic theory of hard disk drive.

Hard Disk and Hard Drive Physical Components

How hard drive works?

(hard disk, hard drive, or HDD) A hard disk is a sealed unit containing a number of platters in a
stack ,

Hard disks may be mounted in a horizontal or a vertical position. In this description, the hard
drive is mounted horizontally

Electromagnetic read/write heads are positioned above and below each platter.

As the platters spin, the drive heads move in toward the center surface and out toward the
edge. In this way, the drive heads can reach the entire surface of each platter.

Hard drive physical component

1-PLATTERS: Platter is a circular, metal disk that

is mounted inside a hard disk drive. Several
platters are mounted on a fixed spindle motor
to create more data storage surfaces in a
smaller area. The platter has a core made up of
aluminium or glass substrate, covered with a
thin layer of Ferric oxide or cobalt alloy. On
both sides of the substrate material, a thin
coating is deposited by a special manufacturing
technique. This, thin coating where actual data
is stored is the media layer.

When the magnetic media is applied to the

surface of the substrate material, a thin
lubricating layer is applied to protect the
material. This complex three layered media is
discussed in detail as follows:
 Hard drive platters

A-THE SUBSTRATE MATERIAL:

The bulk material of which platters are made up, forms the base on which media layer is
deposited. The substrate has no specific function but to support the media layer. The most
commonly used material for making this physical layer is an Aluminium alloy. This alloy is rigid,
lightweight, stable, inexpensive, easy to work with and is readily available. Earlier, since the gap
between the heads and the platter was relatively high, the platter surface being smooth and flat
was less of an issue. However, as technology advances, the gap between heads and platters is
decreasing and the speed that the platters spin at is increasing. For this reason demand for
alternatives on the platter material are increasing. Glass platters are replacing aluminium
platters because they provide improved rigidity, better quality, thinner platters, and thermal
stability.

B-MEDIA LAYER:

The substrate material forms the base upon which actual recording media is deposited. The
media layer is a thin coating of magnetic material applied to the surface of the platters and
where the actual data is stored. Its thickness is only a few millionths of an inch.

Special techniques are employed for the deposition of magnetic material on the substrate
material. A thin coating is deposited on both sides of the substrate, mostly by vacuum
deposition process called magnetron sputtering. Another such method is electroplating, using a
process similar to that used in electroplating jewelry.

C-PROTECTIVE LAYER:

On the top of the magnetic media, is applied a super-thin, protective, lubricating layer. This
layer is called the protective layer because it protects the disk from damage caused by accidental
contact from the heads, “head crash” or other foreign material from entering the drive

2-PLATTER DIVISIONS:
 In order to get maintain the organized storage and retrieval of data the platters are organized
into specific structures. These specific structures include tracks, sectors, and clusters.

3-TRACKS:

Each platter is broken into thousands of tightly packed concentric circles, known as tracks.
These tracks resemble the structure of annual rings of a tree. All the information stored on the
hard disk is recorded in tracks. Starting from zero at the outer side of the platter, the number of
tracks goes on increasing to the inner side. Each track can hold a large amount of data counting
to thousands of bytes.

4-SECTORS:

Each track is further broken down into smaller units called sectors. As sector is the basic unit of
data storage on a hard disk. A single track typically can have thousands of sectors and each
sector can hold more than 512 bytes of data. A few additional bytes are required for control
structures and error detection and correction.

5-CLUSTERS:

Sectors are often grouped together to form Clusters.

6-READ/WRITE HEADS:

The heads are an interface between the magnetic media where the data is stored and electronic
components in the hard disk. The heads convert the information, which is in the form of bits to
magnetic pulses when it is to be stored on the platter and reverses the process while reading.
 Hard disk heards

Hard disk heards

The heads are the most sophisticated part of the hard disk. Each platter has two read/write
heads, one mounted on the top and the other one at the bottom. These heads are mounted on
head sliders, which are suspended at the ends of head arms. The head arms are all fused into a
singular structure called actuator, which is responsible for their movement.

7-THE SPINDLE MOTOR:

 Spindle motor plays an important role in hard drive operation by turning the hard disk platters.
A spindle motor must provide stable, reliable, and consistent turning power for many hours of
continuous use. Many hard drive failures occur due to spindle motor not functioning properly

Spindle motorparts

11-HARD DISK LOGIC BOARD:

Hard disk is made with an intelligent circuit board integrated into the hard disk unit. It is
mounted on the bottom of the base casting exposed to the outer side. The read/write heads are
linked to the logic board through a flexible ribbon cable.
 Hard disk logic board

12-DRIVE BAY:

The entire hard disk is mounted in an enclosure designed to protect it from the outside air. It is
necessary to keep the internal environment of the hard disk free of dust and other
contaminants. These contaminants may get accumulated in the gap between the read/write
heads and the platters, which usually leads to head crashes.
 Hard disk drive bay

The bottom of the disk is also called base casting. The drive mechanics are placed in the base
casting and a cover, usually made up of aluminium is placed on top to enclose heads and
platters. The entire contents placed on the base and cover chamber are collectively known as
the head-disk assembly. Once this assembly is opened, it would instantly contaminate the
contents and eventually ruin the drive.

On the bottom of the base casting is present the logic board, which is separated from the base
casting using a cushioning material.
What is CHS (Cylinder/Head/Sector)?

Many computer users don’t know the hard drive components and how hard drive works. Do you
know how files are stored in your hard drive? How Windows know whether the files are? How to
read files from and write into hard drives? Today, I’ll introduce these shortly. Firstly, let me
introduce some technical terms.

CHS

Cylinder-head-sector, also known as CHS, is a method of giving addresses to data on a hard

drive.

Heads

Every hard drive consists of platters and read-write heads. If a drive has four platters, it usually
has eight read-write heads, one on the top and bottom of each platter. The head value is the
number of read-write heads in the drive.

Cylinders

Each platter is divided into tracks. The cylinder value is the number of tracks on one side of each
platter. There are the same number of cylinders on each side of each platter. The sector value is
the number of sectors in each cylinder (or track), each sector consisting of (normally) 512 bytes.

Older hard drives, such as MFM and RLL drives, divided each cylinder into an equal number of
sectors and the CHS values matched the physical makeup of the drive. A drive with a CHS value
of 500 x 4 x 32 would have 500 tracks per side of each platter, two platters, and 32 sectors per
cylinder, with a total of 32,768,000 bytes (about 31 megabytes). Most modern drives have a
surplus space that doesn’t make a cylinder boundary. Each partition should always start and end
at a cylinder boundary. Only some of the most modern operating systems may disregard this
rule, but this can cause some compatibility problems, especially if the user wants to boot more
than one OS on the same drive.

IDE drives have replaced the MFM and RLL drives, and are much more efficient at storing data.
They use Zone Bit Recording (ZBR), where the number of sectors in a cylinder varies with its
location on the drive. Cylinders nearer to the edge of the platter contain more sectors than
cylinders near the spindle because there is more space in a given track near the edge of the
platter. The CHS addressing system does not work on these drives because of the varying
number of sectors per cylinder. An IDE drive can be configured in system BIOS with any
configuration of cylinders, heads, and sectors that does not exceed the capacity of the drive. The
drive converts the given CHS address into the actual address for the specific hardware.
configuration

Cylinder-Head-Sector

What is Partition Boot Sector?

Each partition (also sometimes called a “logical DOS volume” in the DOS/Windows world) has its
own volume boot sector. This is distinct from the master boot sector (or record) that controls
the entire disk, but is similar in concept. It is also sometimes called the volume boot record or
partition boot sector. Each volume boot sector contains the following:

Disk Parameter Block: Also sometimes called the media parameter block, this is a data table that
contains specific information about the volume, such as its specifications (size, number of
sectors it contains, etc.), label name, and number of sectors per cluster used on the partition.
Volume Boot Code: This is code that is specific to the operating system that is using this volume
and is used to start the load of the operating system. This code is called by the master boot code
that is stored in the master boot record, but only for the primary partition that is set as active.
For other partitions, this code sits unused.

The volume boot sector is created when you do a high-level format of a hard disk partition. The
boot sector’s code is executed directly when the disk is booted, making it a favorite target for
virus writers. The information contained in the disk parameter block is used by the operating
system to determine where other internal structures of the partition are located, such as the file
allocation tables.

NTFS Partition Structure

NTFS Architecture
 Partition Boot Sector

Hard drive interface introduction and comparison

Some readers reflect that they don’t know the difference among hard drives, so this article
introduces the hard drive interface, including IDE, SATA and SCSI.

What is IDE/ATA Hard Drive?

Integrated Device Electronics. It is the most widely-used hard drive interface on the market. The
fancy name refers to how the IDE technology “integrates” the electronics controller into the
drive itself. The IDE interface, which could only support drives up to 540 MB has been replaced
by the superior EIDE (Enhanced-IDE) technology which supports over 50 GB and allows for over
twice as fast data transfer rates. The other most common hard drive interface is SCSI, which is
faster than EIDE, but usually costs more.

Although it really refers to a general technology, most people use the term to refer the ATA
specification, which uses this technology.

What is ATA?

AT Attachment. The specification, formulated in the 1980s by a consortium of hardware and

software manufacturers, that defines the IDE drive interface. AT refers to the IBM PC/AT
personal computer and its bus architecture. IDE drives are sometimes referred to as ATA drives
or AT bus drives. The newer ATA-2 specification defines the EIDE interface, which improves upon
the IDE standard. (See also IDE and EIDE.)

There are several versions of ATA, all developed by the Small Form Factor (SFF) Committee:

ATA: Known also as IDE, supports one or two hard drives, a 16-bit interface and PIO modes 0, 1
and 2.

ATA-2: Supports faster PIO modes (3 and 4) and multiword DMA modes (1 and 2). Also supports
logical block addressing (LBA) and block transfers. ATA-2 is marketed as Fast ATA and Enhanced
IDE (EIDE).

ATA-3: Minor revision to ATA-2.

Ultra-ATA:[b] Also called Ultra-DMA, ATA-33, and DMA-33, supports multiword DMA mode 3
running at 33 MBps.
[b]ATA/66: A version of ATA proposed by Quantum Corporation, and supported by Intel, that
doubles ATA’s throughput to 66 MBps.

ATA/100: An updated version of ATA/66 that increases data transfer rates to 100 MBps.

ATA also is called Parallel ATA.

Hard drive with IDE interface

What is SATA Hard Drive?

Definition

Serial Advanced Technology Attachment, often abbreviated SATA or S-ATA, is a serial link – a
single cable with a minimum of four wires creates a point-to-point connection between devices.
As an evolution of the older Parallel ATA physical storage interface, SATA host-adapters and
devices communicate via a high-speed serial cable.
 Hard drive with SATA interface

According to Wikipedia, SATA computer bus, a storage-interface for connecting host bus
adapters (most commonly integrated into laptop computers and desktop motherboards) to
mass storage devices (such as hard disk drives and optical drives), offers several compelling
advantages over the older parallel ATA/”EIDE” interface: reduced cable-bulk and cost (7 pins vs
40 pins), faster and more efficient data transfer, and the ability to remove or add devices while
operating (hot swapping).

Advantage

Transfer rates for Serial ATA begin at 150MBps. One of the main design advantages of Serial ATA
is that the thinner serial cables facilitate more efficient airflow inside a form factor and also
allow for smaller chassis designs. In contrast, IDE cables used in parallel ATA systems are bulkier
than Serial ATA cables and can only extend to 40cm long, while Serial ATA cables can extend up
to one meter.

What is SCSI?

An acronym for Small Computer System Interface. This interface was introduced as a method of
connecting multiple peripherals to computers. Based on a parallel bus structure, with each
device having a unique ID (or address), the SCSI bus will support up to seven devices plus the
host adapter. Newer ‘wide’ interfaces, used almost exclusively for hard drives, can support up to
15 devices plus the host controller, and can transfer data at burst speeds of up to 320 MB/sec.
Because of the multiple device support and extended cable length (up to 6 meters for SCSI-2),
the higher transfer rate, and the ability to install multiple host adapters on the motherboard or
in available connectors, the SCSI interface is used most often to connect external devices such as
scanners, CD-ROMs, CD duplicators, and multi-drive storage enclosures, while at the same time
connecting to SCSI devices internally, usually on the same adapter.

Although SCSI is an ANSI standard, there are many variations of it, so two SCSI interfaces may be
incompatible. For example, SCSI supports several types of connectors.

The following varieties of SCSI are currently implemented:

SCSI-1: Uses an 8-bit bus, and supports data rates of 4 MBps.

SCSI-2:Same as SCSI-1, but uses a 50-pin connector instead of a 25-pin connector, and supports
multiple devices. This is what most people mean when they refer to plain SCSI.

Wide SCSI: Uses a wider cable (168 cable lines to 68 pins) to support 16-bit transfers.

Fast SCSI: Uses an 8-bit bus, but doubles the clock rate to support data rates of 10 MBps.

Fast Wide SCSI: Uses a 16-bit bus and supports data rates of 20 MBps.

Ultra SCSI: Uses an 8-bit bus, and supports data rates of 20 MBps.

SCSI-3: Uses a 16-bit bus and supports data rates of 40 MBps. Also called Ultra Wide SCSI.

Ultra2 SCSI: Uses an 8-bit bus and supports data rates of 40 MBps.

Wide Ultra2 SCSI: Uses a 16-bit bus and supports data rates of 80 MBps.
 Hard drive with SCSI interface

SCSI hard drive

What is disk sector and bad sector, how to repair bad sector

What is disk sector?

In the context of computer hardware, a sector is a sub-division of a track of a magnetic hard disk
or optical disc. A sector stores a fixed amount of data. The typical formatting of sectors allows
holding 512 bytes (e.g. harddisks and diskettes) or 2048 bytes (e.g. optical discs) of data.

What is a bad sector?

A sector is a small area on the surface of a hard drive or a floppy disk.

Hard drives usually have several platters. The platters are the discs which are covered with
magnetic material which is used to hold data. Floppy disk drives contain only one platter.

Platters are divided into a set of concentric rings called tracks. A 1.44MB floppy disk has 160
tracks. Hard drives have thousands of tracks.

Each of these tracks is divided into smaller storage areas called sectors. A sector is the smallest
storage area on a disk.

What is a Bad Sector?

Hard drives are contain millions of sectors. It is very normal for some of these sectors to be bad
sectors, even when the drive is first manufactured.

In addition, a small number of sectors will normally go bad during the lifespan of a drive.

When this happens, the data in those sectors may be lost, but the data on the rest of the disk
will be unaffected and the disk is still completely usable.

A bad sector cannot be repaired, but it can be marked as unusable. Once marked as unusable,
the Operating System will know not to attempt to store data in that bad sector. The storage
capacity of the disk will be decreased by the amount of storage space in the bad sector.

If your hard drive develops a bad sector, back the hard drive up immediately. If the bad sector
was caused by a faulty drive head, the problem can quickly spread to other sectors on the disk.
How to repair a bad sector?

1. Full format a partition

Right click “My Computer” > “Manage” > “Storage” > “Disk Management”, right click the
partition and select Format. Or open “My Computer”, right click the partition, and then select
Format.

Note: the default format option in Windows XP is Full Format, but in Windows 7, it is Quick
Format. After full format in Windows 7, you cannot recover files.

2. CHKDSK command

Press Start > Run, input “cmd”, input “chkdsk X: /r” (X is the drive letter)

3. Press the <Start> button.

Select <My Computer>.

Under Hard Disk Drives highlight the disk which you want to scan.

Open the <File> menu and choose <Properties>

Open the <Tools> tab.

Click the <Check Now…> button.

In earlier version of Microsoft Windows and DOS, this functionality was built into the “scandisk”
and “chkdsk” utilities.
Once the bad sector or sectors have been “repaired”, continue to back up your hard drive on a
regular basis. Hard drives are mechanical devices and all mechanical devices will eventually fail.

You’d better diagnose your hard drive regularly, you may refer HDD Diagnose software and HDD
monitor software for more info.

Basic Knowledge about Partition and Partitioning

What is a hard disk?

A hard disk/drive is one the part of your computer responsible for long-term storage of
information. Unlike volatile memory (often refers to RAM), which lost its storage information
once its power supply is shut off, a hard disk stores information permanently, allowing you to
save program, files or any other data. Hard disks also have much more powerful storage
capabilities than RAM.

What is disk formatting?

Computer must be able to access needed information on command; however, even the smallest
hard disk can store millions of bits. How does the computer know where to look for the
information it needs? To solve this problem, hard disks are organized into discrete, identifiable
divisions, thus allowing the computer to find any particular sequence of bits easily.

The most basic form of disk organization called formatting. Formatting prepares the hard disk so
that files can be written to the platter and then quickly retrieved when needed. Hard disk can be
formatted in two ways: physically and logically.

Understanding the file systems

All file systems consist of structures necessary for storing and managing data. These structures
typically include an operating system boot record, directories, and files. A file system also
performs three main functions: 1) tracking allocated and unused space, 2) maintaining
directories and filenames.3) tracking where each file is physically stored on the disk.

Different file systems are used by different operating systems. Some operating systems can
recognize only one file system, while others can recognize several. Some of the most common
file systems are: FAT (File allocation table), FAT32 (File allocation table 32), NTFS (New
technology file system), Linux ext2 and Linux swap.

Understanding partitions

After a disk has been physically formatted, it can be divided into separate physical sections or
partitions. Each partition functions as an individual unit, and can be logically formatted by any
desired file system. Once a disk partition has been logically formatted, it is referred to as a
volume.

During the process of formatting operation, you are asked to name the partition, called the
“volume label.” This name helps you easily identify the volume.

Understanding how a computer boots

The way a computer boots from a hard disk depends on the way that hard disk is partitioned and
the way that operating system is being booted. When you turn on your computer, the central
processing unit (CPU) takes control. It immediately executes the instructions built into the
computer’s ROM BIOS, a program which contains the startup procedures. The last part of the
BIOS instructions contains the boot routine. This routine is programmed to read the master boot
record (MBR) from the first sector of the first physical hard disk.
The MBR contains a master boot program and a partition table which describes all of the hard
disk’s partitions. The BIOS boot routine executes the master boot program, which then
continues the boot process. The master boot program looks over the partition table to see which
primary partition is active. If there is only one primary partition, then the partition’s OS is loaded
and booted into operation.

Managing your partitions

The following concepts and activities can help you manage your disk partitions.

Setting an active primary (boot) partition. When you create multiple primary partitions to hold
different operating systems, you must tell the computer which primary partition is to boot from.
The primary partition from which the computer boots is called the active partition. If there is no
active primary partition on the first physical hard disk, your computer will not be able to boot
from your hard disk.

Before you make a primary partition active, make sure that it is a bootable partition. Bootable
partitions are logically formatted and have the necessary OS files installed. Partitions without an
OS cannot be booted.

By creating an extended partition and then dividing it into logical partitions, you can:

Access the Same Files from Multiple Operating Systems

Make Efficient Use of Disk Space

Simplify File Access and Enhance File Security

Understanding drive letters

The OS that you boot assigns drive letters to the primary and logical partitions on each hard disk.
These drive letters are used by you, your system, and all your applications to reference files on
the partition.

Your OS may change the drive letter assignments if you add or remove a second hard disk. Drive
letter assignments may also be altered if you add, remove, or copy a disk partition; reformat a
partition with a different file system; or boot a different OS. These kinds of drive letter changes
can sometimes invalidate parts of your system configuration. For example, applications that are
programmed to look for startup files on a specific drive may no longer launch.

Understanding the BIOS 1024 cylinder limit

The BIOS 1024 cylinder limitation exists because the start and end cylinder values on the
partition table (and some BIOS’s) have the maximum value of 1024. Because some operating
systems such as DOS 6.22 use the CHS (Cylinder, Head, and Sector) values to address sectors on
the disk, they cannot access sectors beyond the 1024 cylinder. When you start your computer
the BIOS boots the operating system using the CHS values to locate the first sector of the
bootable partition. If the partition starts beyond the 1024 cylinder, the BIOS may not be able to
boot it because it cannot address a cylinder number higher than 1024.

Changing the BIOS LBA mode setting

Caution: Never change the LBA mode in your system BIOS once data is present on any hard disk.
Changing this setting may cause data corruption and loss.

Most modern system BIOS designs support LBA or Logical Block Addressing. The LBA mode
setting, no matter enabled on your system or not, determines how your computer translates
logical cylinder-head-sector (CHS) addresses. If you change this setting, the resulting shift in CHS
values may corrupt all the files and partitions on your hard disk(s).

If you must change the LBA mode setting in your system BIOS, first back up all data on your hard
disk(s). Contact the BIOS and/or disk manufacturer’s technical support departments to ensure
that understand how to proceed safely.

Get what you need about hdd tool, pc utilities

file system, HDD Basic, Partitioning, partitions

What is the difference between FAT and NTFS?

We have discussed what FAT file system is, today we’ll introduce the difference between FAT
and NTFS file system. To choose right file system for a partition is very important.

NTFS vs FAT

FAT-NTFS

What is FAT file system?

Many computer users do not pay attention to partition file system, others have heard about file
system, but they do not know the detailed information about File System, especially, FAT and
NTFS, so in this article I’ll explain what FAT file system and I’ll talk about other file system in the
future.

What is FAT File System?

File Allocation Table (FAT) is a file system that was developed for MS-DOS and is the primary file
system for consumer versions of Microsoft Windows up to and including Windows ME. The FAT
file system is considered relatively uncomplicated, and because of that, it is a popular format for
floppy disks; moreover, it is supported by virtually all existing operating systems for personal
computers, and because of that, it is often used to share data between several operating
systems booting on the same computer (a multi-boot environment). It is also used on solid-state
memory cards and other similar devices. It has a serious drawback in that when files are deleted
and new files written to the media, the files can become scattered over the entire media making
reading and writing a slow process. De-fragmentation is one solution to this, but is often a
lengthy process in itself and has to be repeated regularly to keep the FAT file system clean.

FAT12 File System

FAT is also called 12-bit FAT, the file allocation table (FAT) for a floppy disk. The location of files
on a floppy disk is listed in a one-column table in the FAT. Because the width of each entry in a
floppy disk column is 12 bits, the FAT is called FAT12. As a file system for floppy disks, it had a
number of limitations: no support for hierarchical directories, cluster addresses were “only” 12-
bits long (which made the code manipulating the FAT a bit tricky) and the disk size was stored as
a 16-bit count of sectors, which limited the size to 32MB.

What is FAT16?

File allocation table that uses 16 bits for addressing clusters. Commonly used with DOS and
Windows 95 systems.

A 16-bit DOS and Windows file system (see FAT) that varies cluster sizes based on hard drive
size. Cluster sizes range from 4K (for drives up to 127MB), to 4K (255MB drives), 8K (511MB
drives), 16K (1GB drives) and 32K (for drives up to 2GB). The ultimate capacity of a FAT16
partition is 2GB.
 FAT16

What is FAT32?

A disk file allocation system from Microsoft that uses 32-bit values for FAT entries instead of 16-
bit values used by the original FAT system, enabling partition sizes up to 2TB (terabytes). FAT32
first appeared in Windows 95B and is also found in Windows 98 and Windows NT 5.0.

In order to overcome the volume size limit of FAT16 while still allowing memory-constrained
DOS real-mode code to handle the format, Microsoft decided to implement a newer generation
of FAT, known as FAT32, with 32-bit cluster numbers, of which 28 bits are currently used.

In theory, this should support a total of approximately 268,435,438 (< 228) clusters, allowing for
drive sizes in the range of 2 terabytes. However, due to limitations in Microsoft’s scandisk utility,
the FAT is not allowed to grow beyond 4,177,920 (< 224) clusters, placing the volume limit at
124.55 gigabytes, unless “scandisk” is not needed. Windows 2000 and XP placed a limit on the
size of FAT32 partitions they can create at 32 GB, Microsoft says this is by design but does not
explain why, and those versions of Windows are quite capable of reading and writing larger
FAT32 partitions created by other means. FAT32 was introduced with Windows 95 OSR2. The
many changes it incorporated made it a major improvement. However, by partition magic
software, you can create 2TB FAT32 partition and overcome the 32 GB limitation in Disk
Management.

The maximum possible file size for a FAT32 volume is 4 GB minus 1 byte (232-1 bytes). For most
users, this has become the most nagging limit of FAT32 as of 2005, since video capture and
editing applications can easily exceed this limit, as can the system swap file.

32-bit File Allocation Table File System Not the same as VFAT or FAT, which are both 16-bit file
systems.

Please note that FAT12/16/32 is file system of a partition, there is another terminology named
FAT, too. This is just part of FAT file system, besides FAT, there are other parts in FAT file system,
which is MBR (Master Boot Record), DBR (DOS Boot Record), FDT (File Directory Table), Data
zone. NTFS file system also contains MBR, DBR and Data zone. We’ll discuss these terminologies
in the future.