secondary storage

secondary storage

1. primary storage

   • made up of RAM and ROM, this stores programs and instructions for the CPU to process.
   • under direct control by the cpu
   • RAM
     • random access memory
     • where all instructions and data that are currently in use are stored
     • due to the ram being in directly in control by the CPU it allows quick access to in use data and instructions
     • volatile memory- when the power is lost and stored data and instructions are lost too
   • ROM
     • read only memory
     • contains data that is able to boot up your computer and other basic instructions called the BIOS
     • non-volatile memory- when power is lost any data stored in the ROM is not lost and is maintained

2. Secondary storage refers to any storage either external or internal that is not directly controlled by the CPU

3. An example of internal secondary storage would be the hard disk

4. An example of external secondary storage would be a object such as a CD or a external hard disk

5. Three types of secondary storage which are optical, magnetic and solid-state storage

   • Optical
     • use of a lens or a light beam to read and write data onto a disk
     • examples are: CDs, DVDs and blu-rays
     • advantages are: portable, cheap to manufacture, durable in some ways, some formats make it impossible for data to be overwritten
     • disadvantages of optical memory are: small storage capacity, in some cases a special drive can be used to read and write data from a disk in a blu-ray
   • magenetic
     • an example is a hard drive disk
     • use magnets to record data on rotating metal plates
     • Advantages of magnetic storage are: large storage capacity, fast access to read and write data, fairly cheap to manufacture
     • disadvantages of magnetic storage are: data can be altered by magnetic fields and magnetic faults, can suffer from wear and tear due to moving parts