Hardware related to use

Exam tip.

If you are given a question about hardware, be it input, output or storage devices, you will usually be asked to identify a piece of hardware for a given situation and justify why you believe it to be suitable.

It is probably a good idea to use the following points to help you explain your choice:

	Portability - how easy is the back up to carry around?
	Specialist hardware required - tape devices and zip disks require specialist hardware
	Cost - the cost of specialist hardware and the cost of the media need to be considered
	Speed - How quickly can the back up be made? How quickly can the data be retrieved?
	Ease of use - How easy is the device to use? A flash stick or floppy disk are easy, a second hard drive that needs to be removed might take a little more expertise.
	Compatibility - not all machines can read all media. It is not much use if you use a magnetic disk to back up your system, but the person who needs to access the data cannot use the tape as they don't have the hardware.