A data storage device is a device for recording (storing) information (data).
Recording can be done using virtually any form of energy, spanning vibrations (phonographs)
to electromagnetic (light writing a DVD or CDROM, electricity creating a controlled magnetic
field to write on magnetic storage tape).
A storage device may hold information, process information, or both. A device that
only holds information is a recording medium. Devices that process information (data
storage equipment) may either access a separate portable (removable) recording medium
or a permanent component to store and retrieve information.
Electronic data storage is storage which requires electrical power to store
and retrieve that data. Most storage devices that do not require vision and a brain
to read data fall into this category. Electromagnetic data may be stored in either an
analog or digital format on a variety of mediums. This type of data is considered to be
electronically encoded data, whether or not it is electronically stored in a semiconductor
device, for it is certain that a semiconductor device was used to record it on its medium.
Most electronically processed data storage media (including some forms of computer data storage)
are considered permanent (non-volatile) storage, that is, the data will remain stored when
power is removed from the device. In contrast, most electronically stored
information within most types of semiconductor (computer chips) microcircuits are
volatile memory, for it vanishes if power is removed.
With the exception of barcodes and OCR data, electronic data storage is easier to revise
and may be more cost effective than alternative methods due to smaller physical space
requirements and the ease of replacing (rewriting) data on the same medium.
However, the durability of methods such as printed data is still superior
to that of most electronic storage media. The durability limitations may be
overcome with the ease of duplicating (backing-up) electronic data.
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