Final answer:
The round, thin metal plates within a hard drive are called platters, which store data magnetically and spin at high speeds to enable data access by the read/write heads.
Step-by-step explanation:
The correct answer to the student's question about the round, thin plates of metal within a hard drive is d) Platters. In the context of hard disk drive architecture, platters are the circular disks that store information magnetically. They are coated with a magnetic material where data is recorded, and they rotate at high speeds to allow read/write heads access to the data.
Other terms mentioned in the options relate to different aspects of the hard drive's structure:
- Sectors are subdivisions of a track, constituting the smallest storage unit on a platter.
- Cylinders refer to a stack of tracks lined up along multiple platters at the same position.
- Tracks are concentric circles on the surface of the platter where data is read from or written to.
Similarly, when considering a compact disc (CD), data is stored digitally using pits and bumps on a polycarbonate plastic disc, with the data being encoded along a thin spiral track. These tracks are read by a CD player using a laser to detect the pattern of pits and bumps.