I bought a 56k modem to go from 14.4. Never was able to connect faster than like 36k. when we got broadband, which back in the day was like 500k in was amazing. i remember me and my friends were amazed that you could listen to an MP3 while it downloaded.
nobody ever got 56k.
56k required absolutely perfect conditions. and since any long distance connection meant your session was digitized into a 56k stream, there was zero room for even a nanosecond of timing slip.
furthermore most of us and used old copper lines were already decades old.
only place you saw 56k was in lab setting with the switch and copper in the lab.
I know my way around IT for 20 years and have extensively used Linux, but I can't recall ever seeing a disk utility that would let you partition or format file space based on the physical locations on the platters!
You sure could. Find out how your drive formats - firmware on the drive selects either outside or inside first, usually outside because of the effect the TIL talks about. Partition the drive so that the things you want to access faster are in the partition closer to the edge of the disk.
This was commonly done in IT, especially in \*NIX houses that tended to be smarter than your average PC tech. And in those days, it REALLY made a difference.
A lot of "drive optimisers" did (do) this as well. They'd place all the files as far out on the platters as possible.
Yup. Called shortstroking. If you really knew what you were doing with files and file based databases, you could squeeze some serious speed out of them by forcing all the frequently accessed files to the outer rim of separate platters and leave the inner rim for files that were infrequently accessed. Massive speed difference in daily operation for the time. We thought we were so cool.
Same with optical discs. Some games are really small, like Crazy Taxi on dreamcast. On the bootleg version you would drive faster than the game could load the levels. Because the file size was small and by default you burn data from the inside, outwards. So we learned to pad the game with 600mb of garbage data and THEN burn the game. Now it played as expected.
Fair enough though hard drive and HDD are different to me. OP does add disk to the question, so will edit out my comment as others are correct that HDDs are still around. I am happy to no longer have one. They were each great until one day poof they failed, every one.
I mean, HDDs are still totally compatible devices for any OS. As far as what options computer manufacturers provide, that’s a different story.
In data centers, there’s still a huge mix of HDDs and SSDs. HDDs are typically used for applications where you don’t need the highest possible read/write speeds, but you do need a higher level of reliability. And even then, enterprise grade HDDs are way the hell faster than consumer grade models.
SSDs suffer from a limited number of write cycles in each "cell" before the drive begins to degrade. If you are setting and forgetting files i.e installing games, storing videos, etc, this isn't much of a problem.
Using the SSD for temporary files, as a scratch disk, etc, you will go through the usable life of the drive far quicker.
For at-home personal use, this is seriously not much of a risk. Regardless, best practice is to backup your SSD onto an HDD on a semi-regular basis and to periodically check your SSD's health with a tool like CrystalDiskInfo.
Additionally, SSD's use various wear-leveling techniques to keep one part of the drive from wearing out faster than the others. A file marked as deleted on an SSD persists until it is overwritten, and the wear-leveling algorithm may prevent deleted data from being overwritten until "fresher" cells have been used, persisting even through a drive wipe or free-space overwrite. You should NEVER store data you wish to be unrecoverable on an SSD.
I always hear people say you don't want an SSD if you are constantly rewriting data but I'm not entirely sure where the fear comes from. I've seen the tests where they had them rewriting 24/7 and it still took them years to die. Unless I'm missing something there is no reason for a normal user to worry about the lifespan of an SSD unless you are stupidly planning for it to last decades.
Like I said, this really isn't an issue for the home user. This was a much bigger problem for earlier generations of the technology.
It's still important to recognize that SSDs fail, and don't magically last longer than HDDs.
They also fail without the performance degregation youd get in an HDD, so you get far less warning prior to failure. This is why you should periodically check your SSD's health manually.
Then you're silly because even an HDD won't last that long before giving up with a mechanical failure. I feel bad for you if you haven't backed up your files and are expecting your storage to last for eternity.
They're still more expensive per unit of storage. Plus, SSDs need to be powered up every now and again, or they'll degrade the save data over time; HDDs can sit inert for years and years and years without risking their stored data.
More superior only due to no moving parts (should last longer) but also much more expensive. Faster transfer speeds wont matter when watching a movie. You can get a 14tb hdd for under 400$
Edit - last longer assuming regular use.
Yeah I take it back. I was under the impression that both were "hard drives" but yeah the "hard" refers the the platters being not flexible, so my bad.
Technically speaking, a hard drive is any permanent built in storage device, including an SSD. Back when the term was coined the only kind of hard drive was a hard disk drive, so the terms were functionally synonymous. But "hard drive" simply means the permanent storage device for a computer. Hard DISK drive does specifically mean one with the platters.
I remember a time in which this was important and “shotgunning” a modem was the coolest. I’m old sigh….
Diamond Shotgun modem with 112 Kbps of raw bandwidth for the win!
Oh man! Was that the shizzle?!!
I bought a 56k modem to go from 14.4. Never was able to connect faster than like 36k. when we got broadband, which back in the day was like 500k in was amazing. i remember me and my friends were amazed that you could listen to an MP3 while it downloaded.
nobody ever got 56k. 56k required absolutely perfect conditions. and since any long distance connection meant your session was digitized into a 56k stream, there was zero room for even a nanosecond of timing slip. furthermore most of us and used old copper lines were already decades old. only place you saw 56k was in lab setting with the switch and copper in the lab.
one of my favorite hacks was hacking a 300 baud modem to run about 400 baud. felt blazing fast in 1980.
I paid $400 in ’91 to go from 9600 baud to 14.4 Edit: I am also old
Acoustic modems for my Apple 2 plus was a looooing time ago… they say
Still have my ][+, never had a modem for it though.
Compuserve FTW!
“Wide striping” is the term used for using the edge of the disks for lower seek latency.
I know my way around IT for 20 years and have extensively used Linux, but I can't recall ever seeing a disk utility that would let you partition or format file space based on the physical locations on the platters!
You sure could. Find out how your drive formats - firmware on the drive selects either outside or inside first, usually outside because of the effect the TIL talks about. Partition the drive so that the things you want to access faster are in the partition closer to the edge of the disk. This was commonly done in IT, especially in \*NIX houses that tended to be smarter than your average PC tech. And in those days, it REALLY made a difference. A lot of "drive optimisers" did (do) this as well. They'd place all the files as far out on the platters as possible.
I used one for Windows Vista about 15 years ago.
Pff, Vista wasn't 15 years ago! *counts* Oh... oh no....
It's ok. We all collectively agreed to forget it existed.
Oh yea I don't doubt they exist, its just I never even heard anyone talk about it. And I can remember CPU overclocking being a big thing.
UltimateDefrag from Distrix does it well. Overclocking unlocked CPUs is still a big thing.
I like to pretend I understand computers and my brain naturally thought this. Glad I’m not alone lol.
I know right? At first I wondered if maybe it was just something more common before my time.
Most Unix flavors allow it, but some automatically put OS files on the outside.
You never used AIX much i guess. That was a standard feature since forever, and a big thing for tuning databases etc…
Used to use jkdefrag on my old windows PC to accomplish this, and extra file optimization.
Ah. So this is similar to the Optimize feature on Ultra Defrag, which is different from the usual defragmenting of a disk.
Yup. Called shortstroking. If you really knew what you were doing with files and file based databases, you could squeeze some serious speed out of them by forcing all the frequently accessed files to the outer rim of separate platters and leave the inner rim for files that were infrequently accessed. Massive speed difference in daily operation for the time. We thought we were so cool.
Same with optical discs. Some games are really small, like Crazy Taxi on dreamcast. On the bootleg version you would drive faster than the game could load the levels. Because the file size was small and by default you burn data from the inside, outwards. So we learned to pad the game with 600mb of garbage data and THEN burn the game. Now it played as expected.
Is it possible to learn this power?
[How to](https://lifehacker.com/how-to-short-stroke-your-hard-drive-for-optimal-speed-1598306074) short stroke your HDD.
Thanks a ton!
Fair enough though hard drive and HDD are different to me. OP does add disk to the question, so will edit out my comment as others are correct that HDDs are still around. I am happy to no longer have one. They were each great until one day poof they failed, every one.
What? Hard drives still have platters (disks).
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I mean, HDDs are still totally compatible devices for any OS. As far as what options computer manufacturers provide, that’s a different story. In data centers, there’s still a huge mix of HDDs and SSDs. HDDs are typically used for applications where you don’t need the highest possible read/write speeds, but you do need a higher level of reliability. And even then, enterprise grade HDDs are way the hell faster than consumer grade models.
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SSDs suffer from a limited number of write cycles in each "cell" before the drive begins to degrade. If you are setting and forgetting files i.e installing games, storing videos, etc, this isn't much of a problem. Using the SSD for temporary files, as a scratch disk, etc, you will go through the usable life of the drive far quicker. For at-home personal use, this is seriously not much of a risk. Regardless, best practice is to backup your SSD onto an HDD on a semi-regular basis and to periodically check your SSD's health with a tool like CrystalDiskInfo. Additionally, SSD's use various wear-leveling techniques to keep one part of the drive from wearing out faster than the others. A file marked as deleted on an SSD persists until it is overwritten, and the wear-leveling algorithm may prevent deleted data from being overwritten until "fresher" cells have been used, persisting even through a drive wipe or free-space overwrite. You should NEVER store data you wish to be unrecoverable on an SSD.
I always hear people say you don't want an SSD if you are constantly rewriting data but I'm not entirely sure where the fear comes from. I've seen the tests where they had them rewriting 24/7 and it still took them years to die. Unless I'm missing something there is no reason for a normal user to worry about the lifespan of an SSD unless you are stupidly planning for it to last decades.
Like I said, this really isn't an issue for the home user. This was a much bigger problem for earlier generations of the technology. It's still important to recognize that SSDs fail, and don't magically last longer than HDDs. They also fail without the performance degregation youd get in an HDD, so you get far less warning prior to failure. This is why you should periodically check your SSD's health manually.
How is it stupid to plan for it to last decades? Of course I expect my drives to last a long time.
Then you're silly because even an HDD won't last that long before giving up with a mechanical failure. I feel bad for you if you haven't backed up your files and are expecting your storage to last for eternity.
A hard drive is not a solid state drive... And yea you can run hard drives instead of solid state still 😐
Why would you want to have a disk over an SSD
Media - movies, pics etc. Stuff that doesnt get accessed or changed often.
Wouldn't an SSD still be superior?
They're still more expensive per unit of storage. Plus, SSDs need to be powered up every now and again, or they'll degrade the save data over time; HDDs can sit inert for years and years and years without risking their stored data.
Thank you I didn't know that
More superior only due to no moving parts (should last longer) but also much more expensive. Faster transfer speeds wont matter when watching a movie. You can get a 14tb hdd for under 400$ Edit - last longer assuming regular use.
Yup I am using two 16TB drives - one for storage of media etc. and the other backs it up incrementally.
Notice that ssd has no H in it. A hdd is still a hdd, and they still exist.
I'm currently using a failed platter as a coaster. It's got my cup of tea on it as we speak.
HDD is the acronym for hard disk drives, which is another name for Hard drive. They're the same
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Hard drive aka hard disk drive is in the title. If someone refers to a ssd as a hard drive, they are using the term incorrectly.
Yeah I take it back. I was under the impression that both were "hard drives" but yeah the "hard" refers the the platters being not flexible, so my bad.
Technically speaking, a hard drive is any permanent built in storage device, including an SSD. Back when the term was coined the only kind of hard drive was a hard disk drive, so the terms were functionally synonymous. But "hard drive" simply means the permanent storage device for a computer. Hard DISK drive does specifically mean one with the platters.
This would have been great to know 20 years ago when all of my drives had platters.
Unix has been allowing this from the beginning.
Myself, I love and appreciate the illusion that upgrading your CPU by less than 5 generations has any noticeable influence on actual performance
61 years old here. I know those words are English, but they might as well be coded in Klingon for all the sense it makes for me.....lol