CS/IS C446

Data Storage Technologies &

Networks

Agenda
Secondary Storage Technologies
Floppy Disks
Hard Disks
Disk Geometry
Disk Access
 Magnetic Memories
Non-Volatile
Power not needed for retention
Floppy Disks
Flexible, can be carried, limited size
Hard Disks
Hard cased
Originally meant for PCs and mainframes
14 in. diameter for mainframes in 60s
3.5 in. diameter for PCs from 80’s
Now available in various shapes:
Mini disks (2.5 in. dia.) for laptops, gaming consoles and as
external pocket storage
Micro disks (1.68 in. or 1.8 in. dia) for iPods / Cameras / other
handheld devices

Sundar B. CS/IS C446 J.P.Misra

 Floppy Disk
Originally
A single surface disk (8 in.)
Later
2 surfaces; 4X density; (5.25in.)
2 surfaces; High density; (3.5 in)
1.44MB capacity;
Access rate 10 ms (complete sector)
Geometry:
80 tracks per surface;
18 sectors per track (160 x 18 = 2880 sectors)
1 sector = 512 bytes

Sundar B. CS/IS C446 J.P.Misra

 Hard Disks - Geometry
Disk Geometry
Made of platters – each platter has two
sides/surfaces
Platters are stacked on top of each other in a
cylinder
A rotating spindle in the centre spins the platter at a
fixed rotational rate
Each surface has a read/write head that is attached
to an actuator arm
radial movement of the arm allows access to a specific
track

Sundar B. CS/IS C446 J.P.Misra

Source: Data Clinic (dataclinic.co.uk)
 Hard Disks - Geometry
Capacity depends on
Recording density (bits/inch)
Track Density (tracks/inch)
Aerial Density is
Product of recording density and track density
Total capacity is
(# bytes / sector) * (# sectors / track) * (#tracks /
surface) * (# surfaces / platter) * (#platters / disk)
Early days:
Fixed number of sectors / track – sectors were
spaced apart in outer tracks

Sundar B. CS/IS C446 J.P.Misra

 Hard Disks - Geometry
Modern disks
High aerial densities – inter-sector gaps would be a
huge wastage.
Multiple zones
Each zone is a contiguous collection of tracks
each zone has fixed #sectors / track (determined by the
innermost track in the zone)
Capacity equation
Replace (#sectors/track) with (average # sectors / track)
OR
Compute per zone and add

Sundar B. CS/IS C446 J.P.Misra

 Hard Disks - Addressing
Access is always in group of 1 or more contiguous
sectors
Starting sector address must be specified for access
Addressing:
Cylinder, Head, Sector (CHS) addressing
Logical Block Addressing (LBA)
Sequential Numbering of Sector addresses
Issues in LBA:
Bad sectors (before shipping)
Address Sliding / Slipping could be used – skip bad sectors for
numbering
Bad Sectors (during operation)
Mapping – maintain a map from logical number to physical CHS
address;
Remap when you have a bad sector – use reserve sectors

Sundar B. CS/IS C446 J.P.Misra

 Hard Disks –Access Time
Read and writing in sector-sized blocks
Typically 512 bytes
Access time
Seek time (tseek)
Required to move the arm and position over required track
Average seek time (typically 6 to 9ms)
Max. single seek time (upto 20 ms)
Rotational Latency (tavg-rotation)
Head on track, wait time for first bit of the sector to be
over/under the head.
Max. wait time = 1 single rotation i.e. tmax-rotation
Avg. wait time = ½ of tmax-rotation i.e. tavg-rotation
Transfer time (tavg-transfer)
Time for rotating one sector over/under the head

Sundar B. CS/IS C446 J.P.Misra

 Hard Disks [5]
Data Sheets
Seagate NL-35 Specification
HP C3323

Sundar B. CS/IS C446 J.P.Misra