Hard disk drive stores all your data including operating system, applications, user files and documents.

Different Hard Drives

IDE- Lot of your older Hard Drives use these, which is a ribbon like cable.

SATA- Most of today's Hard Drives use this kind of connection, which takes considerably less space then IDE connections.

SCSI- Is the only connection type that can reach 15,000 RPM speeds.

What one should i get?

Usually when deciding a Hard Drive there three important things to look at.

Connection Type:

Make sure if you choose IDE, SATA, or SCSI that your motherboard has the available ports. Other then that IDE or SATA is mostly just preference.

Space:

Space should the the most important aspect to look at when choosing a Hard Drive. Make sure you get enough GB's of space for your needs to, put things in perspective.

1000mb=1gb

A standard mp3 song takes 3-5mb

Modern Video Games any where between 3-20gbs

A single layer DVD is 4.7 GB

Speed:

Today's hard drive can go from 7,200 rpm's all the way to 15,000 rpm's. When choosing one keep in mind that faster speeds means higher CPGB "cost per giga byte". For example you get get a 7,200 1TB "1000gb" hard drive for around $90 were as a 15,000 RPM 300GB SCSI hard drive for around $800.

Hard Drive Checklist

1.Make sure you have enough space to accommodate data storage for several years.

2. Check what connection types your motherboard supports.

3. Read reviews, buy quality hard drive brands, for ex. Western Digital, IBM, Seagate, Maxtor, and Fujitsu. Nothings worse then a hard drive failing and loosing all your data.