Chapter 7 PowerPoint Question Solution

1. Compare primary storage and secondary storage, and discuss the most important characteristics
of secondary storage.

Primary storage: Volatile storage, Temporary storage, and Random Access Memory (RAM). Secondary
storage: Nonvolatile storage and Permanent storage. Secondary storage characteristics: Media,
Capacity, Storage devices, and Access speed.

2. Discuss hard disks including density, platters, tracks, sectors, cylinders, head crashes, internal,
external, and performance enhancements.

Hard disks use rigid, metallic platters that are stacked on top of one another. Store and organize files
using tracks, sectors, and cylinders. Susceptible to head crash. Head crash occurs when read-write head
makes contact with the hard disk’s surface or with particles on its surface. Internal hard disks are located
inside the system unit. Internal are used to store programs and data files. External hard disks are
removable. They are used to complement internal hard disk. Performance enhancement: Disk caching to
improve hard disk performance, redundant arrays of inexpensive disks (RAID) to expand storage and to
improve access speed, file compression and decompression to increase capacity.

3. Discuss optical disks including pits, lands, CDs, DVDs, Blu-ray, and hi def.

Optical discs hold over 128 gigabytes (GB) of data. Attributes: Lands and pits. The three types: Compact
Disc (CD), Digital Versatile Disc (DVD) and Blu-Ray Disc (BD). Compact Disc (CDs): Optical format. They
hold a capacity of 700 MB of data on one side. The three basic types: Read only (CD-ROM), Write once
(CD-R) and Rewriteable (CD-RW). Digital Versatile Discs (DVDs) are similar to CDs. Their capacity is 4.7
GB on one side. The three basic types: Read only (DVD-ROM), Write once (DVD+R and DVD-R) and
Rewriteable (DVD+RW, DVD-RW, and DVD-RAM). Blu-ray Disc (BDs) are the next generation optical disc
for recording high-definition (hi def) video. Their capacity is 50 GB on one side. Blu-ray optical drives are
usually capable of reading standard DVDs and CDs in addition to Blu-ray discs.

4. Discuss solid-state storage including solid-state drives, flash memory, and USB drives.

Solid–state drives (SSDs) have no moving parts. They are faster and more durable than hard disks. Flash
memory cards are widely used in laptops, smartphones, and GPS navigation systems. USB Drives (or
Flash Drives) connect to USB ports and have a capacity of 1 GB to 256 GB.

5. Discuss cloud computing and cloud storage.

Cloud computing is where the Internet acts as a “cloud” of servers. They are applications provided as a
service rather than a product. Cloud storage services are online storages. The benefits/advantages
include: Maintenance, hardware upgrades and file sharing and collaboration. Using a cloud storage
service makes it easy to upload and share files with anyone.
 6. Describe mass storage devices including enterprise storages systems, file servers, network
attached storage, RAID systems, organizational cloud storage, and storage area network
systems.

Mass storage devices: Large amounts of secondary storage requirements. Enterprise storage system:
Safe use of data across an organizational network. Devices include: File servers, Networked attached
storage (NAS), RAID systems and Organizational cloud storage. Storage area networks are architectures
linked to remote computer storage devices. User’s computer provides file system, but SAN provides disk
space. SAN house data in remote locations and still allow efficient and secure access.