Inside of Hard Drive

[@joshuamarius]

✌Thanks to everybody for all the kind comments and views. Please feel free to comment on how you got to this video, which country, which professor and University. ⚠If you are interested in reading the story of how this video was made, here it is: www.digitaljoshua.com/the-story-behind-inside-of-hard-drive/

[@sword4942]

I from turkey 🇹🇷

[@Intellectual_House]

from Algeria :) thanks bro for the video

[@grxninesix]

It’s so cool that your still active 14 years after.. I watched this video many times 10 years ago

[@joshuamarius]

Thanks for the nice comment and glad you enjoyed it ✌🏻

[@ladaf]

I came here from an EDX course :)

[@joshuamarius]

It's been reported to me that the video has been used in many schools in several countries. It's a good illustration of how the head/platters work together. Glad you liked it.

[@UtshaBasak]

*Thanks for the video*

[@taniaandgeorgeprogaming9806]

Thanks for the video,it is really amazing!I came here after learning about it from Dr Chuck in Coursera course Python for evrybody.That shows the quality of your video here because Dr Chuck is literally a legend, a very inspiring man. Greetings from Athens, Greece

[@AritzPeñaOrtiz]

My teacher has shown us this video, thank u :D

[@thunderbirdice]

I just came from Dr Chuck course too.@@taniaandgeorgeprogaming9806

[@jyotika3810]

so tru

[@joshuamarius]

Python/Coursera who is taking this course? Can one of you please contact me and let me know what this is about? I was recently contacted by students in India and they said the video is being used over there. This is truly an honor, and I would like to know where else and how the video is used. Glad I was able to contribute to education. Thanks to all of you for taking the time to comment.

[@qazqazulight388]

joshuamarius Course starts June 1. I am pre watching the video lectures from the ibook.Python for Informatics. This is a free book that is the book for the Coursera course. the i book includes the video lectures. The link to the course is www.coursera.org/course/pythonlearn and the name of the course is "Programming for Everybody (Python)"

[@qazqazulight388]

joshuamarius Oh, and the course is free, and the book is free. No pre requisites

[@RebeckaZavaleta]

joshuamarius here from coursera

[@RonaldDas42]

joshuamarius I was redirected to your video, from coursera Programming for everyone!

[@LecheroMalvado]

joshuamarius I'm taking the coursera PR4E from México, cheers.

[@joshuamarius]

Welcome Coursera Students! Comment and make sure to share which country you are in! Enjoy!!

[@JustLoveEverything]

joshuamarius Canada :)

[@nouradawi835]

palestine :)

[@alexskye006]

joshuamarius From Philippines! Thanks for the video!

[@juandavido.s1327]

joshuamarius Colombia :D

[@duducarblog]

joshuamarius Mongolia

[@rezn66]

The actual precise mechanics of a hard drive is absolutely amazing.

[@c0rvus996]

Now I finally know what makes that "loading" sound on a computer!

[@vladimirirkhin]

same

[@afonintoli]

The video is still on Coursera , it's part of a history now lol)

[@dinikasaxena]

I am so glad I joined this course and saw this video. I know the course has barely begun and it's a little too early to be giving such good reviews but I can't help it. I can't help but appreciate people who bring out and unveil such mystifying secrets about technology. I've read how the hard drive works maybe a hundred times before, even did assignments on it, but this was priceless. I'm pretty sure I won't forget how exactly an HDD works after watching this video. Thanks for uploading it!

[@luisjeis]

Coursera, I'm from México

[@nichiperez1426]

lol 7 years later I’m on coursera doing the same course. Hope ya finished and benefited from it 💪🏽

[@joshuamarius]

In the future, hard drives won't even need to spin: SSD ;-D

[@flashplayer4511]

You predicted the future

[@Sazuri]

@@flashplayer4511 Very accurately too. But as of now, HDD gives more in terms of dollar per storage space value. We'll just have to wait 10 more years to see.

[@memedoge1602]

@@Sazuri But the speed is low

[@anwarulbashirshuaib5673]

Do you think DNA is the future of data storage?

[@memedoge1602]

@@anwarulbashirshuaib5673 lol.. you are living in 3020 😂

[@hikikhun6668]

When you powered it up, I was like: "Oh my god! That's where that nostalgic sound comes from!"

[@KingRaccoon-ze5rn]

THX right?

[@jaames]

I might be 17 years too late, but I sure am grateful to see an old HDD work in action. I almost always hear there's a mechanical aspect to a HDD compared to it's newer counterparts (SSD) but it was so cool to see it in action. I know there's a spinning disc and an arm that works kind of like a phonograph (without being able to write data as we all know phonographs are just read-only) but dang, it was awesome. Currently studying Python at the University of Michigan under Dr. Charles Severance.

[@joshuamarius]

Thanks for your comment. Glad you appreciate the Video!

[@sunitsrichandan2092]

now thats interesting..never thought it takes so much of work inside the computer for just a click on the mouse..really great...thanks joshuamarius n thank Dr. Chuck. -Love from INDIA.

[@joshuamarius]

+Sunit Sahoo Thanks for the nice comments. Glad it helped you.

[@rainspren]

Those sounds take me back to childhood, both with the machines I used to use and with the ones my father tinkered with. I almost miss noisy hard drives now. Brilliant video, thanks a lot!

[@olufemijolugbo8704]

This has totally changed my perspectives on what a hard drive is, anyone noticed how the hard drive effortlessly formats, but find it much tougher to write data

[@oladotunrotifa6795]

Yes, I did

[@MrPoppints]

I can't believe that a coursera course just gave me huge nostalgia

[@austinmchaney]

Have you taken a coursera course? Im a littel late to the party... but I'm highly thinking of going with coursera to start learning python,c++, and java. Just wonder your input if you have. Thanks

[@MrPoppints]

@@austinmchaney I did take a beginners course on python a while back. I personally had a very good experience with it. Some stuff I really liked about the python course I took: - The teacher was very good: he explained stuff well and he had a good sense of humor too. - Generally I could go at my own pace. So if I felt like doing more lessons, then I could. - All the videos have captions, which is great for a non-native English speaker like me! - I think there is a forum/discussion board thing, where you could talk about your assignments with your fellow students. Or at least somewhere you could talk about your assignment with your peers in case you got stuck somewhere, which is great!

[@Ingenius3]

Taking the coursera python/programming for everybody course. I'm from Romania, and it's just mad to see how people developed software on top of automated hardware that receive certain instructions and get to work. And hardware and software work together to show graphical representation of software on displays. To think machines can display nowadays things like huge 3d worlds, games like GTA 5, Skyrim or something like that...just wow. It's just wonderful. Humans rock!

[@joshuamarius]

Since many of you are wondering... - It was an old 3.2 GB Hard Drive, so I dont mind if it blows up :-D - The deleted folder had tons of files in it - The copy paste was performed aith a folder that had tons of files one it

[@jimmyhuajh]

this video makes me wanna backup my data

[@soysauce6600]

did you ever back up your data sir?

[@TrollGamerStudios]

here from coursera

[@raghavmangalapalli4742]

Arent we all

[@rishabhsirvaiya136]

coursera

[@in7942]

YES!!!

[@copecheung8720]

From coursera too

[@donnieuy]

From Coursera too

[@jamcdonald]

Pretty incredible. I was a programmer for 10 years and the technology still amazes me. I also can't believe 747s can get off the ground.

[@joshuamarius]

Depends on the Operating System. For Example in XP with a NTFS partition, when you delete a file, the file is marked with a special character and basically is hidden from you, it can still be recovered.

[@omarshelter]

Hi your video is being viewed in my university ...computer organizaton subject for electric engineers in Egypt 🇪🇬 👏

[@joshuamarius]

@@omarshelter Thanks so much for your comment! Best wishes ✌👍

[@joshuamarius]

@@omarshelter Can you please let me know which University :) Thanks

[@omarshelter]

@@joshuamarius Zagazig electric engineer University

[@joshuamarius]

@@omarshelter Thanks so much for replying :)

[@joshuamarius]

"This experiment was performed on an old hard drive, do not try this with newer expensive hard drives, it is a bit risky." Folder copied was Quake III Multiplayer (Over 500 MB)

[@maxfremk7976]

Just tough it’s gonna be fun to reply to a 10 years old comment.

[@SaulxDR]

Laughs in SSD

[@satan2583]

@@SaulxDR *Laughs in refusal to change*

[@topgunpilot2547]

Cool game! :D

[@harasen_haras5]

Before it was explained to me how hard drives worked, I used to imagine a hard drive as a large rectangle with data all over it and where the reading/writing thing was attached to something that could move it on both a Y and an X axis. Further back than that, I imagined a hard drive's interior as a magical blue cloud. I did know that it wasn't like that, but I didn't know how the huge amounts of information were stored inside of it.

[@THAHITMAN509]

That's so tight! Man I would like to see how it looks inside the HD when you download something. :P Good video BTW. This was my first time looking inside a HD.

[@pajimacas]

I come from Dr. Charles Severance's Python Course. Mabuhay from the Philippines... 🇵🇭

[@ArtistFormallyKnownasMC]

Free Code Camp brought me here. I'm watching Python is for Everyone right now. A kind person in the comments of the youtube video playlist linked this video and another that the professor mentioned, so here we are! Thanks for posting this, and leaving the channel and video up all these years later. I'm trying to go into IT and every bit helps. Also, desktop, dial-up and defrag sounds are probably the only sounds that ease my anxiety, so win win. Thanks again!!

[@joshuamarius]

Thank you so much for the nice comments. Glad you found the Video useful :)

[@aurumon]

i got here from py4e (python for everyone), from the second video which is about hardware it was a fun and educational watch. the spinning sound was nostalgic; reminded me of background colors and pictures i can put in ms word, and my first online game endless online (or was it neopets) lol

[@kindertak5396]

Nobody: Not a single soul: 1:30 minutes of hard drive spinning and doing actions.

[@Kahanji]

February 2015 COURSERA Intake????/

[@postaditya]

This is just awesome! I've been doing these actions for years, but never thought of 'how it'd happen actually on a HDD', thanks for the vdo.

[@smellthel]

This video is older than most people on the internet

[@Crimptube]

It's amazing how a hard drive really works!! its spinning at an incredible speed and the needle can pick up whatever u want in the matter of milli seconds! its incredible with all that moving that hard drives last so long.

[@krishnaag6366]

You alive bro?

[@T.K.9]

That ticking sound.... so thats where that annoying sound is coming from. One of my drive creates the exact sound .

[@Sonicrush007123]

That grinding sound? All HDDs make them, my 1.5 year old desktop and my 3 year old laptop with a 1 year old HDD.

[@T.K.9]

they do. But the dying once tend to sound louder. And as well as when the drive is used for both OS and storage/apps. Right now my 6 year old HDD which was an OS + Storage from the past now converted and re used as Storage only and having an SSD for OS. And the sound from my old HDD is now gone.

[@Sonicrush007123]

eroOtoko1 My dad has an external HDD plugged into our router so we can transfer files only the same network. The external HDD is 4-5 years old and is a Hitachi 500 GB HDD. It does make grinding noises. On your HDD as you use it as a storage, did you set Windows so not send temporary files to the SSD and instead send them to the external HDD? Always have everything sent to the HDD as when you write on the SSD, the less life.

[@Utking3]

Billy O'Reilly That is why want an ssd, lol.

[@Sonicrush007123]

Jøran Igland I honestly, don't want an SSD. They're expensive, don't live quite as long, and the more you write to it, failure is more expected.

[@subodhkasaudhaniitk796]

I am from India. Thank you for such informative videos ❤

[@joshuamarius]

Thanks for the nice comment :)

[@dulanjanabandara5808]

I'm here because of Dr. Chuck's Python tutorial ❤❤❤

[@cryptomoongems5356]

I'm right behind you. week 2 😀 How far have you gotten with your coding studies?

[@OkiemElektroniki]

I remember watching this back in the days when I was like 8. Good old times! Thanks for that video :)

[@joshuamarius]

@@OkiemElektroniki Thanks for the nice comment ✌🏻🙏🏻

[@roshimon6670]

From Coursera. Wonderful video. Thanks @joshuamarius :)

[@seunesan]

+roshi mon same here!

[@roshimon6670]

+olusegun Adebayo Nice :)

[@MohamedSalah-ev3ix]

+roshi mon i am taking this course from coursera man

[@Billymixs]

is truly amazing the speed at which the disk rotates..

[@joshuamarius]

Nope. I did the experiment on a regular room. I was amazed too that it worked for about three months after the experiment.

[@jinxxyouoweme7604]

Not here from Coursera, but my OS professor put this video in his lecture slides! Great video, it was really interesting to see!

[@joshuamarius]

Thanks for the comment. What University, what class in particular and where are you located? Thanks :)

[@joshuamarius]

Did you get my previous comment by any chance?

[@joshuamarius]

Te cuento que despues de destapar el disco, yo analice diferentes procesos como copiando archivos, defragmentacion, eliminando archivos etc., a ver cual proceso era mas presentable, con mucha actividad de la cabeza. Copiando la carpeta de unos 550 MB al disco se demoro bastante debido a la edad del disco. Despues tuve que ensayar varias veces. Entonces antes de empezar a firmar, el disco habia funcionado destapado por unos 45 minutos. Duro 3 meses aunque no quieras aceptarlo.

[@sysprime]

I was thinking of doing the same thing and then I figured someone must have something on youtube already. I liked the way you described what the drive was doing when it was functioning. Again, good job.

[@flutterflowexpert]

now show us SSD HD :D

[@DFX2KX]

lol, it'd be just a bit underwhelming. :P

[@samivan9116]

I would think that it would stand for Solid State Drive Hard Drive SSD HD

[@joshuamarius]

I did ha ha! Look at my inside of Flash Drive video - it will be the same, just electronics chips looking like they are doing nothing ;)

[@flutterflowexpert]

@@joshuamarius wow, i waited 7 years for that :D

[@joshuamarius]

@@flutterflowexpert Lol. Time is flying :)

[@Poshua92]

You are correct about the magnetic arm. It looks like the head is touching the platter but it is barely scratching the surface, where it is able to shoot the magnetic data stored on the platter.

[@cstrife999]

SSD's don't have "less space" They are newwer and just like standard hdds they are working to make sure they are stable... They have 1tb ones now...

[@realEchoz]

Technically you can create an unlimited amount of storage with both hard disk and SSD technology, but since hard disk technology is significantly cheaper, I would consider SSDs to have less capacity. A 16 TB SSD PCIe drive has been announced, but It will probably cost around 100,000 dollars. While achieving that capcity in a 3 1/2" HDD is probably not going to happen in a while, one could easily make a twice or thrice as big hard drive with that capacity. But SSDs are leagues ahead of hard disks in terms of speed, so I'd put it as simply as: Hard drives win at capacity and SSDs win at performance. That might change soon as SSDs become more popular and receive more development.

[@philenrogers10]

Hi here, calling from 2019! we now have ssd storages for desktop with 14 terabytes on them.

[@Lpedraja2002]

Joshua, that was an excellent video. I always wondered how was the movement of the mechanical arm but was too afraid of wasting a hard drive. Thanks for the sacrifice lol.

[@matthewgaunt4358]

Fascinating, thanks for posting

[@gxgolden1]

Thanks for the video. I finally get to see the HD at work.

[@aurijustriksys2695]

Here from coursera :) I wonder how many views all of us from coursera gathered for this video :D

[@pcpmendonca]

Dr Chuck's Python course, 2021, still in a pandemic world, writing from Houston, TX.

[@cindihancock1373]

Here from Coursera's course "Programming For Everybody (Python)!

[@PCWorld2ady]

Good Luck for learning the amazing python language :)

[@depsylon4235]

This video was also linked in a os lecture in germany, by Prof. Dr. Frank Bellosa from kit, in case you're wondering

[@joshuamarius]

Yes, thank you! I wish all students would post the Lecture, University and Professor's name. Thank you so much for taking the time to post this information.

[@depsylon4235]

@@joshuamarius yeah, I saw you asking about it and rarely getting an answer so I thought I'll tell you directly. I'm just wondering, is this just nice to know for you or are going to do anything with this information ?

[@joshuamarius]

@@depsylon4235 It's nice to read how people are impacted and how the video has traveled the World, but also, I like to personally thank the Professors, read a bit about their work, and also promote their courses if I can 🙏 ♻

[@seanfl33]

Anyone from Coursera?

[@joshuamarius]

You only need one, but I recommend that people have two - the second one for backup. I take it a step further though. After I save my data on my main computer, I backup to a server and then once in a while I make a second backup which I put inside a fireproof/waterproof safe.

[@edkozak9925]

Let's play a game who here is not for couresera Python course?

[@twizzy9293]

Mèeeeeeeeeeee

[@Pulsed101]

So that's what makes the sound!!! It's like a mini writable compact disc? Very cool, thanks :)

[@GandaraVideos]

Cool. 5 stars man. the head reader is pretty close to the surface of the platters. no wonder the hard drives are so delicate.

[@slymm619]

Coursera 2014 (June)

[@kultechsystems7744]

This is great Stuff. Never open an full hard disk earlier and noticed it working. Its very informative.Thanks COURSEA!!!!

[@jamesfallen1284]

Here from coursera.

[@nadias3628]

i was glued to my monitor for the whole 1:55 :) so fascinating to see how it actually works not just on paper

[@joshuamarius]

Thanks for the comment :)

[@Marc_Masters]

Py4e playlist brought, here

[@MohamedSalah-ev3ix]

Python course from coursera , November 2015, from Egypt thanks man, this video is wonderful.

[@AlbyTheMovieCreator]

I certify as my own original work .....coursera honor code

[@joshuamarius]

They aren't as bad as people think. I've had dozens of hard drives with only one minor failure in my entire computer career, so I have lucked out. On top of that, I always backup my data accordingly on several drives. My method of installing hard drives is simple: Reduce vibration as much as you can, and dedicate a fan to cool it, regardless of what people say. Also, make sure you have a good, stable, power supply. I've sold over 200 hard drives with no failures in several years.

[@cstrife999]

SSDs don't have moving parts... If yours is making noise might want to get your head checked... Insane asylum here you come...

[@joshuamarius]

@JustMyHobbies That was powering the drive physically and no it is not safe unless it is an external hard drive and it is not in use. If you are referring to a force shutdown within an operating system that is different. The shutdown is issued within the operating system after the drive was determined to not be in use.

[@joshuamarius]

It is a Samsung SpinPoint WU32543A, 2.5 GB, 3.5" x 1/3H - 5400 rpm. I do not have the manufactuerer's date. The folder deleted was Quake III Arena which had tons of files and I think the size of the folder was about 500 MB.

[@MichaelGooden]

Thanks for the video, helped me explain to my brother how hard drives work inside :)

[@joshuamarius]

Some Operating Systems such as XP use your idle time to optimize itself. There is a setting to disable such feature.

[@joshuamarius]

That's a good question. The truth is I have no Idea. I know I was NOT in a dust free room. I've heard that older drives had better fault tolerance towards this kind of stuff but I have no evidence of that. That drive continued working for many days after the test and once I was done with all the testing, I just threw it away.

[@joshuamarius]

What you have is an external enclosure. These are also available in USB or eSata. Basically inside, you have a small board that converts the drive's IDE or SATA port to a FireWire in order for the drive to be portable or external.

[@joshuamarius]

You may be getting confused. When you copy text, from Word or Notepad, etc. you copy onto the memory - this is not copying physical data on the hard drive. The data text gets stored in memory (RAM) and then allows you to paste back. The copy/paste operation shown here is copying data that is stored on the hard drive.

[@Sertdatarecovery]

Nice display of HD sounds and the mechanics of a drive. An old one, but still.

[@joshuamarius]

When the file is deleted, the location where it was at is marked as ready to be written again. So what happens is, when you create or store another file, it overwrites the location where the file you just deleted was. This is why when you are trying to recover data, it is never wise to copy newer files to the hard drive. If you do, you risk overwriting the location of the previous files: The one's you are trying to recover. These locations are known as Allocation Units, in the Master File Table.

[@classicalmix]

Thank you man, this is discovery channel stuff, Not something we can see everyday. Good job!

[@MauFerrusca]

thank u for this demonstration. always wanted to know that the noises stood for.

[@joshuamarius]

I've found computers sitting outside in the rain for hours, and they powered on fine :) Good stuff.

[@motezart2867]

Another Coursera here.. Congrats on becoming so popular and cool video.

[@joshuamarius]

There are many crazy fixes such as the freezer trick. I even read in an A+ book that if you have a drive that refuses to be recognized you can plugin another drive (exact model) then disconnect it while the PC is on and plug in the bad drive. I've also heard of people tapping the drive and many other things. These are NOT recommended but I know they have worked for many people. It's just taking a chance because you can actually make it worse and lose your data for real.

[@redsox0717]

Of all the components of a computer, the device I am most fascinated with is the hard drive. I mean it's amazing how a few platters can hold so much data, I mean the new 1.5 tb hard drives are the same size as like 1 gig hard drives, it's amazing

[@DataWiseDiscoveries]

Loved to know about its working ... it just beautiful piece of technology that ruled the past...

[@joshuamarius]

Depends on the drive. Older drives are very loud - just like the one shown in the video. Newer drives are quite, SSDs make no sound ;)

[@joshuamarius]

The main purpose of a hard drive is to store data. It is used to store your Operating System, Applications and user created files such as Documents, music (mp3 files), installations, etc. There are faster hard drives than others. You have to look at the specifications such as Interface SCSI, SATA or IDE, RPM (5400, 7200 or 10000 RPM) and Cache (2, 8, 16, or 32 MB).

[@joshuamarius]

SATA hard drives rarely use jumpers because unlike IDE which use Master, Slave and Cable Select on one connector, SATA drives each get their own connector and do not need any type of configuration. In some cases you have to configure a SATA 2 hard drive to work as a SATA 1 for older motherboards or SATA connectors. These are the 1st generation SATA connectors, sometimes called SATA 150, SATA 2 is also called SATA 300.

[@REDSTORMCROWN]

hey man!,congrats on your 948 thousand plus views!! Thats like heaps of stadiums of people!i think u would need 10 beijing olyimpic stadiums if every1 was watching in one spot! =D

[@HostOfTheNightmare47]

Thanks for your help with this video. Cheers from Brazil.

[@joshuamarius]

Bom dia! Thanks for such the humble comment :) Hope you found it useful.

[@iang.ortega1788]

video was used as an example from my MIS 15 class here at Sacramento State

[@joshuamarius]

Thanks so much for the comment. Can you tell me the name of the professor? Thanks :)

[@joshuamarius]

@TheCrazyJesus Files remain on the hard drive not the RAM, so it's the Hard Drive's job to read and write to itself. You may be getting confused with copying items to the clipboard (copying pasting images/text within applications).

[@joshuamarius]

Traditionally platters are made of a light aluminum alloy and coated with a magnetizable material such as a ferrite compound that is applied in liquid form and spun evenly across the platter or thin metal film plating that is applied to the platter through electroplating, the same way that chrome is produced. Newer technology uses glass and/or ceramic platters because they can be made thinner and also because they are more efficient at resisting heat. Source: Webopedia

[@joshuamarius]

If you have low disk space then just look for files to delete. Download Ccleaner which searches for many temporary files along with junk and gets rid of them. You can also disable System Restore, uninstall programs you are not using, uninstall Windows components, and perform a Disk Cleanup (Go to my computer, right click on your drive, select properties, then select disk cleanup).

[@linuxlove4004]

yeah, it's actually not a CD, it's either a glass or metal platter, but you are correct. the read/write head is on the needle and that's how your data is read.

[@antiandy]

Cool stuff, i knew how the inside of a HD worked, but have never actually seen it, thanks for the great vid.

[@joshuamarius]

Depends. Are you looking to boot up an Operating System from your Flash drive?

[@Dodge2703]

It's quite interesting to see the hard drive actually working. Its amazing how fast the head moves. Is it true the head doesn't actually touch the disc surface but is so close that not even a particle of smoke would fit in the gap? That's just something I heard. Anyway, cool video

[@EarlFaulk]

Nice vid, didnt know the read write head was so fast as it turned into a blur several times.

[@nickhighbury3011]

This is incredible! Am here with the Jan 2016 Coursea Python class.

[@slobert]

February here :)

[@FactVault5584]

september here;(

[@dark258]

I'm just amazed it actually worked... did you test it in a Clean-Room or a normal room?

[@joshuamarius]

Yes, if you look at the video you can see that the drive is on an external enclosure. Also, you can install XP on a 2.5 GB hard drive if you use a program such as nLite. With nLite I have been able to shrink Windows XP installations to under 1 GB in size after install.

[@produKtNZ]

Nice, but i have a decent question for ya.. Why is it that with the cover off this drive, it hasn't thrown the pc into a lock, or it hasn't completely shat itself with read errors due to dust particles etc? Is it because old harddrives simply have none of this error detecting technology? or they have a much higher fault tolerance?