Disk Interface

Disk interface.
A disk interface is the circuit board that allows a floppy drive or hard drive to
communicate with the computer. If a component on a disk interface
board fails and causes it to no longer work, the computer
cannot communicate with the drive, even though the drive still
works. If a drive appears to be in working condition, a data
recovery company may repair or replace the disk interface
board to get the drive working again.
Physical Structure of a Hard Disk (Cont’d) A hard disk

contains a stack of platters, circular metal disks that are mounted inside
the hard disk drive and coated with magnetic material, sealed in a metal case
or unit. Fixed in a horizontal or vertical position, the hard disk has
electromagnetic read or write heads above and below the platters.
hysical Disk Structure

 Disk are made of thin metallic platters with a read/write
head flying over it.
 To read from disk, we must specify:

o cylinder #
o surface #
o sector #
o transfer size
o memory address
 Transfer time includes: seek, latency, and transfer time
ReadWrite heads
Platters
Spindle
Track
Sector
Seek Time
Rot
Dela
When referring to a computer hard drive, a disk
partition or partition is a section of the hard drive that is
separated from other segments. Partitions enable users to
divide a physical disk into logical sections. For example,
allowing multiple operating systems to run on the same
device.
With older file allocation tables, such as FAT 16, creating

smaller partitions allows a computer hard drive to run
more efficiently and save more disk space. However, with
new file allocation tables, such as FAT32, this is no longer
the case.
Which drive is the first partition?

On Microsoft Windows computers, by default the first
drive (disk 0 or drive 0) contains the first partition is
the C: drive.
What does a partition look like?

The best way to see what a partition looks like is to open
the disk management tool.
Types of partitions
There are also several partition types. Below
is a listing of some of these partitions with a
brief description. Some of these partitions
may not be available in your partition utility.
Partition Description
AIX partition (boot) A partition used with the AIX operating system
Boot partition As defined by Microsoft, a boot partition is a p
contains the files required for a system startup
partition
BSD/OS partition (OpenBSD) A partition used with the BSD operating system
DOS partition (12-bit, 16-bit) A partition used with older versions of MS-DOS
DOS extended partition A partition that is extended from one or more
DOS partitions.
DRDOS (hHidden) A partition used with the DR. DOS operating s
Extended partition A partition that is extended from one or more
partitions.
Hibernation partition A partition used with older hibernation program
HPFS partition (OS/2 IFS) An HPFS partition used with IBM OS/2 and Mic
Linux (Linux native, Linux A partition used with various variants of the Li
swap, Linux systems.
extended, ext2fs)
MINIX A partition used with the MINIX operating syst
NON-DOS partition When using Microsoft fdisk, a NON-DOS partit
partition that is not native to the Microsoft ope
example, this could be a Linux partition.
NEC DOS A partition used with the old NEC DOS variant
NEXTSTEP A partition used with the NeXTSTEP operating
Novell NetWare A partition used with the Novell NetWare oper
NTFS A partition used with Microsoft Windows NT 4.
and Windows XP.
Partition Magic (PowerQuest) A partition created using the Partition Magic u
by PowerQuest.
PC-ARMOUR A partition created by the PC ARMOUR security
created this partition is commonly protected b
Primary In a Microsoft operating system, the Primary P
the main or first partition used for the Microso
system.
Solaris X86 A partition used with the Sun Solaris X86 platf
system.
System partition As defined by Microsoft, a system partition is a
contains the system32 directory. Also see: bo
Tandy DOS A partition used with the old Tandy DOS varia
Unix System V (SCO, IRIX, A partition used with various Unix operating sy
ISC, Unix, UnixWare, etc...)
VMware (VMware Swap) A partition used by VMware.
XENIX (XENIX /usr) A partition used with the Xenix operating syste

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Disk interface.

Physical Structure of a Hard Disk (Cont’d) A hard disk

hysical Disk Structure

 To read from disk, we must specify:

 Transfer time includes: seek, latency, and transfer time

With older file allocation tables, such as FAT 16, creating

Which drive is the first partition?

What does a partition look like?

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