Fallibilities of Hard Drives

You may have heard of hard drive crashes or loss of data from a hard drive many times. Let us try to understand what can possibly go wrong with the hard drive. To understand them better, let us have a look at how a hard drive works initially.

How Hard Drives Work

Within the hard drive, a spindle is present that supports many platters that are made of aluminium or cobalt alloy and have a coating of magnetic material present on their surface. At the base of the spindle, a motor is present that helps in the rotation of the platter at high speeds.

The magnetic material that is present on the surface of the platters is divided into a large number of regions called as sectors. Each of these sectors can store a bit of data within them. The sectors have a specific address that can be used to access the data stored in them.

The sectors are made of a magnetic dipole. An assembly of read/write heads is present within the hard drive. A read/write head is present close to each surface of every platter. By application of a magnetic field, the dipole can be aligned in order to assign a binary value to it. Thus, data can be stored onto the hard drive.

When data is to be read from the hard drive, the magnetisation of the dipole is detected and the necessary signals are generated accordingly.

Possible Reasons for Hard Drive Failure

• Data loss from a hard drive occurs frequently due to a head crash. During a head crash, the read/write head comes in contact with the platters that are present within a hard drive. This leads to damage to the surface of the platter and thus, the data that is present in that particular region is lost permanently.



• Problem with the air filter of a hard drive can result in hard drive failure as well. The filter is present in order to maintain the air pressure within the hard drive at levels corresponding to the atmospheric air pressure. Due to a fault in the air filter, a dust particle may enter into the drive and settle on one of the platters thus resulting in data loss and damage to the hard drive.



• The hard drives fail after certain periods of time due to wearing of its components.



• Logical errors within a hard drive are more frequent than the above reasons for failure. A logical error may occur within a hard drive due to power surges or when power failure occurs when data is being written onto the hard drive, due to faulty software, etc.

• The hard drives should not be mishandled. One should avoid shocks, falls etc.



• If one does not have the necessary experience, one should never open the hard drive without technical assistance.



• To prevent the attack on a computer by a virus, one should install anti-virus software and update it regularly. This will ensure protection against the latest viruses. If you do not have much experience with computers, the firewalls provided by the anti-virus software should be activated.



• If you make use of your computer for long periods of time regularly and if the power supply you have is not reliable, one should make use of an UPS system.



• One should prevent the hard drive from overheating as this may lead to loss of data stored in it. To ensure this, one can make use of an air-conditioned room or avoid using the computer for long durations of time.



• Fragmentation of the files can increase the data access time as well as increase the risk of loss of data due to logical errors. Hence, one should ‘defragment’ the hard drive at regular intervals of time.



• One should ensure that the computer shut down completely before switching of its power supply. This will help in preventing loss of data.



• One should backup the important data that is present on your hard drive as a safety measure.



• While operating, one should not keep their computer covered. Also, there should be adequate amount of space surrounding the computer. This will ensure that the temperature around the computer remains in check.

Article Source: http://www.rightarticle.com

James Walsh is a freelance writer and copy editor. If you are concerned about data loss and would like more information on Data Recovery see www.fields-data-recovery.co.uk

Please Rate this Article

5 out of 54 out of 53 out of 52 out of 51 out of 5 

Not yet Rated