February 15, 2026
Electrons, but make it drama
How Is Data Stored?
Internet swoons over simple guide to where your data lives—plus one epic 'fragment' meme
TLDR: Dan Hollick’s explainer shows how computers store data using layers of fast and slow memory, and why that speeds up your apps. Commenters cheered the clarity and design, while a jokey 'how disk get fragment?' sparked debate about defrag on old hard drives vs modern SSDs.
Dan Hollick’s plain‑English tour of where your files live has the comments in full heart‑eyes. “Thanks for sharing,” sighed one fan; “This is a crazy good explanation,” cheered another; “Very nicely designed page,” added a third. The gist: your computer’s “brain” (CPU) and graphics brain (GPU) hate waiting, so they use a ladder of memory and clever tricks to trap electrons so your stuff sticks around. And yes, it’s a free resource, which triggered bonus praise and a victory‑lap link to makingsoftware.com, plus shout‑outs to Dan Hollick.
But the comment of the day — “how disk get fragment?” — lit up a mini debate. In simple terms: on old spinning hard drives, files can get chopped into pieces across the disk, so “defrag” tidies them up; on modern solid‑state drives, it’s different and you usually don’t need to. Storage keeps data even when the power’s off. Cue jokes about defragging your brain, and memes about caches being tiny snack drawers and RAM being the walk‑in pantry. The hottest take? That plain language beats specs every time. For once, the internet agreed: no gate‑keeping, just good vibes and a guide you can actually explain to your non‑tech friend.
Key Points
- •Computers use a memory hierarchy to balance speed, capacity, and power, minimizing latency for CPUs/GPUs.
- •L1 cache is about 64 KB with ~1 ns access, storing instructions and data, and is fed by larger, slower caches.
- •Caches use SRAM, which retains data while powered without needing refresh, enabling high speed.
- •DRAM provides larger capacity (tens of GB) at slower access (~100 ns) and requires continual refresh to preserve data.
- •Outboard storage (HDDs/SSDs) offers terabyte-scale, non-volatile capacity but is much slower than inboard memory.