Everything about Data Storage Device totally explained
A
data storage device is a device for recording (storing) information (data).
Recording can be done using virtually any form of
energy, spanning from manual muscle power in handwriting, to acoustic vibrations in phonographic recording, to electromagnetic energy modulating magnetic tape and optical discs.
A storage device may hold information, process information, or both. A device that only holds information is a recording
medium. Devices that process information (data storage equipment) may either access a separate portable (removable) recording medium or a permanent component to store and retrieve information.
Electronic data storage is storage which requires electrical power to store and retrieve that data. Most storage devices that don't require
vision and a brain to read data fall into this category. Electromagnetic data may be stored in either an
analog or
digital format on a variety of mediums. This type of data is considered to be
electronically encoded data, whether or not it's electronically stored in a
semiconductor device, for it's certain that a semiconductor device was used to record it on its medium. Most electronically processed data storage media (including some forms of
computer data storage) are considered permanent (non-volatile) storage, that is, the data will remain stored when power is removed from the device. In contrast, most
electronically stored information within most types of semiconductor (computer chips)
microcircuits are
volatile memory, for it vanishes if power is removed.
With the exception of
barcodes and
OCR data, electronic data storage is easier to revise and may be more cost effective than alternative methods due to smaller physical space requirements and the ease of replacing (rewriting) data on the same medium. However, the durability of methods such as printed data is still superior to that of most electronic storage media. The durability limitations may be overcome with the ease of duplicating (
backing-up) electronic data.
Terminology
Devices that are not used exclusively for recording (for example
hands,
mouths,
musical instruments) and devices that are intermediate in the storing/retrieving process (for example
eyes,
ears,
cameras,
scanners,
microphones,
speakers,
monitors,
projectors) are not usually considered storage devices. Devices that are exclusively for recording (for example
printers), exclusively for reading (for example
barcode readers), or devices that process only one form of information (for example
phonographs) may or may not be considered storage devices. In
computing these are known as
input/
output devices.
An organic
brain may or may not be considered a data storage device.
All information is
data. However, not all data is
information.
Many data storage devices are also media players. Any device that can store and playback
multimedia may also be considered a media player such as in the case with the
HDD media player. Designated hard drives are used to play saved or
streaming media on
home entertainment systems.
Trends
International Data Corporation estimated that the total amount of digital data was 281 billion
gigabytes in 2007, and had for the first time exceeded the amount of storage.
Data storage equipment
Any
input/output equipment may be considered data storage equipment if it writes to and reads from a data storage medium. Data storage equipment uses either:
- portable methods (easily replaced),
- semi-portable methods requiring mechanical disassembly tools and/or opening a chassis, or
- inseparable methods meaning loss of memory if disconnected from the unit.
The following are examples of those methods:
Portable methods
Hand crafting
Flat surface
Fabrication
Cylindrical accessing
Card reader/drive
Tape drive
Disk accessing
Cartridge accessing/connecting (tape/disk/circuitry)
Peripheral networking
Flash memory devices
Semi-portable methods
Hard disk drive
Circuitry with non-volatile RAM
Inseparable methods
Circuitry with volatile RAM
Neurons
Recording medium
A recording medium is a physical material that holds data expressed in any of the existing recording formats. With electronic media, the data and the recording medium is sometimes referred to as "software" despite the more common use of the word to describe computer software. With (traditional art) static media, art materials such as crayons may be considered both equipment and medium as the wax, charcoal or chalk material from the equipment becomes part of the surface of the medium.
Some recording media may be temporary either by design or by nature. Volatile organic compounds may be used to preserve the environment or to purposely make data expire over time. Data such as smoke signals or skywriting are temporary by nature. Depending on the volatility, a gas (for example atmosphere, smoke) or a liquid surface such as a lake would be considered a temporary recording medium if at all.
Ancient and timeless examples
Optical
- Any object visible to the eye, used to mark a location such as a, stone, flag or skull.
- Any crafting material used to form shapes such as clay, wood, metal, glass, wax or quipu.
- Any branding surface that would scar under intense heat (chiefly for livestock or humans).
- Any marking substance such as paint, ink or chalk.
- Any surface that would hold a marking substance such as, papyrus, paper, skin.
Chemical
Modern examples by energy used
Chemical
Thermodynamic
Photochemical
Mechanical
Modern examples by shape
A typical way to classify data storage media is to consider its shape and type of movement (or non-movement) relative to the read/write device(s) of the storage apparatus as listed:
Paper card storage
Tape storage (long, thin, flexible, linearly moving bands)
Disk storage (flat, round, rotating object)
Magnetic bubble memory
Flash memory/memory card (solid state semiconductor memory)
Bekenstein (2003) foresees that miniaturization might lead to the invention of devices that store bits on a single atom.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Data Storage Device'.
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