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No, it doesn't. On modern hard drives, "needle" which isn't a needle will be returned to its parking position by rotation of the disk. When you cut power, disk doesn't freeze. It continues to rotate for some time until friction halts it. That amount of time is more than enough to return the read/write head into its parking position. Also on modern hard drives no electricity is needed to keep the head above the disks.
– AndrejaKo
Commented Sep 26, 2010 at 14:16
Maybe @BillP3rd, our hard disk drive expert, could give a better explanation.
– AndrejaKo
Commented Sep 26, 2010 at 14:17
Modern voice coil head actuator hard drives float the heads on a film of air. Upon loss of power, the heads immediately park before the platters even have a chance to lose much rotational speed and therefore the air film the heads float upon. The only way to crash the heads is to give the drive a good slam that causes the heads to break through the air film, something that modern laptops detect through accelerometers and take evasive action to protect the heads, parking them before the computer hits the floor.
– Fiasco Labs
Commented Jan 16, 2012 at 22:42

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