Rarely covered, but critical is knowledge of the seek timings on different media, and that same from different manufacturers, as well as the transition times fo

Rarely covered, but critical is knowledge of the seek timings on different media, and that same from different manufacturers, as well as the transition times for reads and writes, and finally many storage devices have additional information one can request, or it is just there if you know: the ability to have I/O buffer state transition callbacks, such as buffer filled, ring buffer rotated, last byte read and so on. I spent time working at disc manufacturers, where various dedicated software companies, mostly database developers and game devs, compile this information for their company's needs.