What mechanism does a magnetic hard drive use to write data?

A magnetic hard drive uses spinning disks to read/write data magnetically because it operates based on magnetic principles. The drive consists of one or more platters coated with a magnetic material. These platters rotate at high speeds, while read/write heads move across their surfaces.

When writing data, the write head generates a magnetic field, which modifies the orientation of the magnetic particles on the disk surface, encoding the information as a series of magnetic patterns. For reading, the read head detects these magnetic patterns and converts them back into electrical signals that the computer can process.

This mechanism is fundamental to traditional hard disk drives (HDDs), differentiating them from other storage technologies like flash memory, which uses electronic mechanisms to store data, or laser technology, which typically pertains to optical drives.