Absolute Beginners Guide to A+ Certification. Covers the Hardware and Operating Systems Exam

In this chapter

• Common Characteristics of Magnetic Storage Devices

• Floppy Disk Drives and Media

• IDE/ATA Hard Disks

• SCSI Interface

• CD-ROM, CD-RW, and DVD Drives

• Removable-Media and Tape Drives

• External Hard Drives

Want to keep what you create with your PC? You need storage! Magnetic storage devices such as hard disks, floppy drives, and removable-media drives, and optical storage devices such as CD-ROM, CD-RW, and various types of read-only and rewritable DVD storage are standard with virtually every PC. However, upgrades and additions to storage are frequently made during the life of a computer. Reliable storage of programs and data is a critical factor of customer satisfaction and computer use. In this chapter, you'll learn how to configure and troubleshoot major storage devices.