Module 3/ unit 4 Poge 276 Module 3 / Unit 4 Using Storage Devices Objectives On completion of this unit, you will be able to: Contrast volatile and non-volatile storage types. © Describe the types of system memory modules used in PCs. Describe the types and features of Hard Disk Drives, Solid State Drives, optical drives, and flash memory. Syllabus Objectives and Content Examples This unit covers the following exam domain objectives and content examples © 2.2 Given a scenario, set up and install common peripheral devices to a laptop/Pc. Devices (External hard drive) 2.5 Compare and contrast storage types Volatile vs. non-volatile + Local storage types (RAM, Hard drive [Solid state vs. spinning disk], Optical, Flash drive)System Memo! Using Strago Devices ‘System memory is the main storage area for programs and data when the ‘computer is running. System memory is necessary because it is much faster than accessing data in a mass storage system, such as a hard disk. System memory is a type of volatile memory called Random Access Memory (RAM) Volatile means that data is only retained in the memory chips while there is a power source. Alarge amount of system memory is essential for running a PC. The size of RAM determines a computer's ability to work with multiple applications at the same time and manipulate larger files. If there is not enough system RAM, the memory space can be extended by using disk space (virtual memory), but accessing the disk is very slow compared to accessing RAM. ‘Some notable RAM vendors include Kingston, Crucial (Micron), Corsair, PNY, and Integral. DRAM ‘System RAM is a type of RAM called Dynamic RAM (DRAM). DRAM stores each data bit as an electrical charge within a single bit cell. The electrical charge gradually dissipates, causing the memory cell to lose its information. In order to preserve the information, dynamic memory has to be refreshed periodically by accessing each cell at regular intervals. SDRAM Many different types of DRAM have been developed and become obsolete. Since the mid-1990s, variants of Synchronous DRAM, or SDRAM, have been used for system memory EE ‘SDRAM packaged in 168-pin DIMMs. Image © 123rf com. Page 27Module 3/ unit 4 Poge 278 SDRAM is synchronized to the system bus. It has a 64-bit data bus, meaning that in each clock cycle, 64 bits of information can be delivered to the CPU. Consequently, if the bus is running at 66 MHz, the bandwidth available to the memory controller is 66°64 or 4224 megabits per second, Dividing by 8 gives the bandwidth in megabytes per second (528 MBps). SDRAM for desktop PCs is packaged in DIMMs (Dual Inline Memory Module). Laptops use a smaller form factor called Small Outline DIMM (SO- DIMM). Double Data Rate SDRAM (DDR SDRAM) Double Data Rate SDRAM (DDR SDRAM, or just DDR) is an updated type of SDRAM featuring "double pumped” data transfers. This means that 64 bits of information are transferred at the start of a clock cycle then another 64 bits at the end, For example, if the bus speed is 100 MHz, the maximum data rate would be ({64+64]*100)/8 = 1600 MBps (Megabytes per second), Since its first introduction, ODR has moved through DDR2, DDRS, and DDR4 technology updates. These increase bandwidth by increasing the bus speed, as opposed to the speed at which the actual memory chips work, This produces scalable speed improvements without making the chips too Unreliable or hot. The drawback is increased latency, as data takes longer to access on each chip. Latency is offset by improving the memory circuitry. DRS SDRAM in 240-pin DIMMs. Image © 123.1.com. DDRz2, DDR3, and DDR¢ still use DIMM and SO-DIMM packaging, but the form factors of the edge connectors are different, so you must obtain modules that match the type of slots on the motherboard. For example, if you have a DDR4 motherboard, you cannot reuse older DDR3 modules with it.Mass Storage Devices (ash btns Random Access Memory (RAM) is a volatile type of storage; it requires a constant power source to work. A mass storage device provides non-volatile storage where the data is preserved when the power is turned off. Every ‘computing device has at least one internal mass storage device (or "fixed drive") to store the OS and application files plus user data Hard Disk Drives Hard Disk Drives (HDD) are one of the most widely used type of mass storage device, Data on an HDD is encoded magnetically on specially coated glass or plastic platters accessed by drive heads. The platters are spun at very high speeds, giving rise to the term "spinning disk" drive. There are two formats for HDDs: 3.5" units are the type used in desktops; 2.5" form factors are used for laptops and as portable external drives. 3.5" form factor hard disk drive, Image © 123rf.com. HDD Capacity and Performance HDDs are available in a range of capacities. At the time of writing this ranges from 100 GB up to 10 TB (10,000 GB). HDD performance is largely a measure of how quickly it can read and write data. One factor in determining read/write speeds is the speed at which the disks can spin, measured in revolutions per minute (RPM). The higher the RPM, the faster the drive. High performance drives can reach 15,000 RPM; budget and midrange performance units are 5400 and 7200 RPM. RPM is one factor determining access time (measured in milliseconds), which is the delay that ocours as the read/write head locates a particular position on the drive. A high performance drive will have an access time below four ms; a typical drive might have an access time of around nine ms. ‘Some of the major hard drive vendors include Seagate, Western Digital, Maxtor, Hitachi, Fujitsu, Toshiba, and Samsung. age 279Module 3/ unit 4 Page 280 HDD Interfaces Over the years, there have been several different standards for the controller and bus connecting an internal hard disk to a PC. These standards include EIDE/PATA, SATA, and SCSI, Modem PCs and laptops use the SATA (Serial ATA) interface. A SATA port can support a single drive, Most motherboards have at least four SATA ports External Hard Drives HDDs are also available as external units. The drive is shipped in a special enclosure, which provides some combination of USB, Firewire, eSATA, andlor Thunderbolt ports. External units may be designed for desk use (3.5" drives) or to be portable (2.5" drives). 3.5" drives require a separate power supply too; consequently, most external drives now use the 2.5" form factor. Standard Bandwidth Notes USB 2 480 Mbps | Many devices were released to this older standard and remain in use. USB 3 5 Gbps | Widely supported on devices released in the UsB 3.1 410 Gbps last few years. Thunderbolt 2 20 Gbps | Uses MiniDP connector. Thunderbolt 3 40 Gbps | Uses USB-C connector. Bandwidth only Supported at up to 0.5m cabling. Cc ‘An external drive can also be connected via a network. This is often referred to as Network Attached Storage (NAS). Often, NAS appliances can house multiple HDDs. NAS is covered in more detail in Unit 4.4. Solid State Drives (SSD) Solid State Drives (SSD) are designed to replicate or supplement the function of the hard drive. Solid state storage uses a type of non-volatile memory technology called flash memory. Flash memory is non-volatile because it does not need a power source to retain information even though it is a transistor-based technology. Compared to spinning disk storage, flash memory is very small and light and much faster. Mass manufacturing has seen prices fall to very affordable levels, though the cost per gigabyte of an SSD is still considerably higher than an HDD and it is unusual for SSDs to be supplied with more than 512 GB capacity. g While HDD specifically refers to a spinning disk drive, you may come across the term "hard drive" used to mean the main fixed disk in the computer, whether the drive format is HDD or SDD.SSDs are available as either standalone units or hybrid drives. In a hybrid Using Storage Devices drive, the SSD portion functions as a large cache, containing data that is accessed frequently. The magnetic disc is only spun up when non-cached data is accessed. This reduces power consumption but can degrade performance. 2.5" form factor solid state drive. Image © 123rf.com. ‘SSDs can be packaged in the same 2.5" form factor with SATA connectors as HDDs. Better performance is obtained from SSDs installed as PCle adapter cards or using the M.2 adapter interface, as the PCle bus is much faster than SATA. Optical Discs and Drives Compact Discs (CDs), Digital Video Discs or Digital Versatile Discs (DVDs), and Blu-ray Discs (BDs) are storage formats for consumer multimedia, such as music and video. They are referred to as “optical” drives because a laser is used to read data from the dises. These formats have been adapted for data storage with PC systems. The CD/DVDIBD drives used with PCs and gaming consoles can also play consumer versions of the discs. ‘The data version of the CD (CD-ROM) became ubiquitous on PC systems as it has sufficient capacity (700 MB) to deliver most software applications. DVD is an improvement on CD technology and delivers substantially more capacity {up to about 17 GB). DVDs are used for some software installs and for games and multimedia. Blu-ray is the latest format for delivering High Definition movies and computer games Recordable and Rewritable Optical Discs A recordable version of the CD (CD-R) was developed in 1999. Where an ordinary CD uses a premastered layer of foil with pits and lands to represent binary data, CD-Rs use a layer of photosensitive dye, A special laser is used to transform the dye, mimicking the structure of a normal CD, in a process called burning. Most ordinary CD players and drives can read CD-Rs, but they may not playback properly on older equipment. Page 281Module 3/ unit 4 Poge 262 CD-Ris a type of Write Once Read Many (WORM) media. Data areas once written cannot be overwritten. If there is space, a new session can be started on the disc. However, this makes the disc unreadable in older CD-ROM drives. A rewritable (or multisession) disc format (CD-RW) has also been developed. DVD Media DVD is similar to CD but with better storage capacity, DVD discs can be dual- layer andlor double-sided. The different permutations result in the storage capacities listed below. Standard Capacity Description DvD-5 | 4.7GB Single layer/Single sided. DvD-9 | 85GB Dual layer/Single sided DvD-10 | 9.4GB Single layer/Double sided DvD-18 —17.1GB Dual layer/Double sided. DVD-Video | Up to 17.1 GB Commercially produced DVDs using MPEG ‘encoding and chapters for navigation (can be single or dual layer and single or double sided). DVD-Audio Format for high quality audio (superior sampling rates and 5.1 surround sound for instance) C MPEG stands for Motion Picture Experts Group. Refer to Unit 3.5 for more information about file formats, encoding, and compression Like CD, there are recordable and rewritable versions of DVD, some of which support dual layer recording. There are two slightly different standards for recordable and rewritable DVDs, referred to as DVD-R/DVD-RW versus DVD+R/DVD+RW, Most drives can read all formats but write in either + or = format. Many consumer DVD players can play DVD:R discs. Consumer DVDs feature copy protection mechanisms (Digital Rights Management) and region coding. Region coding, if enforced, means that a disc can only be used in a player from the same region. Blu-ray Discs Blu-ray Discs (BD) are replacing DVD as the media for distributing consumer multimedia and video games. Blu-ray is principally required to cope with the demands of High Definition video recording and playback. HD requires more bandwidth and storage space because it uses a much higher resolution picture (1920x1080 compared to 720x480 [NTSC}) and better audio quality (digital surround sound).standard BD has a capacity of 25 GB per layer. Dual-layer discs can store up Storage Devices to 50 GB and are readable in ordinary BD drives, Triple-layer 100 GB and quad-layer 128 GB discs are defined in the BD-XL specification. These require BD-XL compatible drives for writing and reading, There are currently no double-sided formats Like DVDs, consumer Blu-ray Discs are likely to be DRM-protected and may be region coded. Optical Drive Units APC normally has an optical drive installed within the case, but it is now relatively uncommon for laptops to include optical drives. An optical drive can be connected via USB as an external unit. Optical disc drive. Image © 123rf com. Optical drives are rated according to their data transfer speed. The original CD drives had a data transfer rate of 150 KBps. Subsequently, drives have been available that offer multiples of the original rate; this would be around 52x for new models, offering transfer rates in excess of 7 MBps Many optical drives also function as recordable/rewritable burners (or writers) ‘Such drives feature three speeds, usually expressed as the Record/Rewrite/Read speed (for example, 24x/16x/52x). DVDs feature a higher transfer rate, with multiples of 1.38 MBps (equivalent to 9X CD speed). The fastest models feature 16X read speeds. The base speed for Blu-ray is 36 MBps and the maximum theoretical rate is 12x (432 MBps). At the time of writing, most drives are 2x or 4x; 2x is the minimum required for movie playback. Page 283Module 3/ unit 4 Poge 264 Removable Flash Memory Devices There are many ways of packaging flash memory other than fixed SSDs. One of the most popular is the USB drive (or thumb drive). This type of drive simply plugs into any spare USB port. Capacities are typically between 1 and 64 GB ] (128-512 GB thumb drives are available but are very expensive). Some USB drives may come with security features, such as encryption or fingerprint recognition USE thumb drive (lef) and SD memory card (ight). image © 123r.com. Another popular type of packaging is the memory card, used extensively in consumer digital imaging products, such as digital still and video cameras. There are several proprietary types of memory card. Some popular examples include Secure Digital (SD) and Compact Flash (CF), plus formats such as Sony Memory Stick and xD Picture Card that are no longer produced. Memory cards are available in a number of sizes up to 256 GB capacity. There are 512 GB and even 2 TB cards but they are only available at a high price point. v SD cards also come in Mini (small) and Micro (smaller) form factors. The smaller form factors can be used with regular size readers using a caddy to hold the card. Many PCs are fitted with Multi-card Readers with two or three slots that will accommodate most of the cards on the market. Some may have single slot, readers that can only accept a single brand (typically SD). Mutt-card reader. Image © 1231f-com. Data transfer rates vary quite widely between different devices. The best- performing cards are about 312 MBps. Another use for flash memory is as the main storage for electronic devices, such as tablets, smartphones, mobile media players (or mp3 players), handheld games consoles, and so on. Such devices typically have a few megabytes or gigabytes of internal flash memory that can be expanded using a memory card (though most will only support one particular brand of card). Some of these devices may require special software to transfer music between the device and a PC (such as iTunes for Apple's range of iPod players). Very often though the device's flash memory will appear as a storage device when the media player is connected to the PC (via a USB port)