Technology in hard disks

The hard disks inside every desktop and laptop are designed to emit low noise and generate, and also to be relatively insensitive to vibration.

Two important designs features that enable this are fluidic bearings and winglets on the head of the arm.

Hard disks were once made with tiny rolling element ball bearings, however nowadays almost all hard disks are made with fluidic (journal) bearings. These bearings are more reliable, quieter, generate less vibration, and cheaper than the ball bearings.

Another important design feature are the winglets on the end of the read / write head. The hard disks spin at 4200rpm or higher which causes the air to move. Small wings attached to the sides of the hard disk head enables the head to “fly” precisely above the rotating disk. This design makes the hard disk less sensitive to vibration.

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