T&T: Alternative to hard drives in computers ( was: conservation)

[Doug]

USB drives in gigabyte sizes can hold a lot of charts and other data which
would reduce calls to the disk drive. I use one as well to move data from PC
to PC. Application calls or operating system calls to the disk would cause the
resting disk to spin up on occasion. A PC doing nothing will even spin up the
disk without some tweaking to keep it quiet. I recall seeing a mini-pc that
was available with solid state disk.
One of my laptops, a very old Thinkpad is still on the original disk drive. It
has been used in 2 trucks, a Jeep and most recently a boat. On land it is used
for mapping and has been from FL to ME and back a few times, currently in the
Jeep from ME to MD and back every month and is left running the 13 hour trip.
A Compaq laptop, now 6 years had the disk go bad after 3 years of airplane
commuting. I packed it in my suitcase and checked the bag so while it was not
running during this time, it did get dropped, tumbled and thrown many many
times.
The physically tiny discs in today's hard drives are quite robust and their
thinness and small diameter are not significantly prone to inertia. One can
fit gigs on a quarter size glass platter. Heads can smack a surface when
dropped off a table though. To reduce risk, the laptop can be placed on a hard
flat board on a layer of foam. The board permits air to flow, in some cases
into the case as many fans intake thru the bottom. Putting a laptop directly
on a soft material can cause it to cook.

Maine Doug