Access time is the time delay or
latency between a request to an electronic system, and the access being completed or the requested data returned
* In a
computer
A computer is a machine that can be programmed to carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations ( computation) automatically. Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic sets of operations known as programs. These prog ...
, it is the time interval between the instant at which an
instruction control unit initiates a call for
data
In the pursuit of knowledge, data (; ) is a collection of discrete values that convey information, describing quantity, quality, fact, statistics, other basic units of meaning, or simply sequences of symbols that may be further interpret ...
or a request to
store data, and the instant at which delivery of the data is completed or the storage is started.
See also
*
Memory latency
*
Mechanical latency
*
Rotational latency
*
Seek time Higher performance in hard disk drives comes from devices which have better performance characteristics. These performance characteristics can be grouped into two categories: access time and data transfer time (or rate).
Access time
The ''acces ...
References
Network access
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