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60TB Disk Drives Could Be a Reality In 2016

Posted by Soulskill on from the that's-a-lot-of-cat-pictures dept.

CWmike writes "The maximum areal densities of hard disk drives are expected to more than double by 2016, according to IHS iSuppli. Hard drive company Seagate has also predicted a doubling of drive density, and now IHS iSuppli is confirming what the vendor community already knew. Leading the way for greater disk density will be technologies such as heat-assisted magnetic recording (HAMR), which Seagate patented in 2006. Seagate has already said it will be able to produce a 60TB 3.5-in. hard drive by 2016. Laptop drives could reach 10TB to 20TB in the same time frame, IHS iSuppli stated. It said areal densities are projected to climb to a maximum 1,800 Gbits per square inch per platter by 2016, up from 744 Gbits per square inch in 2011. Areal density equals bit density, or bits of information per inch of a track, multiplied by tracks per inch on a drive platter. This year, hard drive areal densities are estimated to reach 780Gbits per square inch per platter, and then rise to 900Gbits per square inch next year."

12 of 293 comments (clear)

  1. For depressed people by SadBob · · Score: 5, Funny

    Since pirates are depressed people, these will be perfect fit for depressed pirates.

  2. More capacity, but what about I/O? by mlts · · Score: 5, Informative

    One thing we have had issues with is that even now, the issue with drives is how fast we can get data in and out of it.

    Even the high end SAN makers know this and tell people to always use RAID 6 on the backend, just because the window of time that it takes to rebuild a drive is so long these days that it can easily allow for a second drive failure to happen with no protection.

    What I really will dread seeing is an external 60TB drive that is stuck with a USB 3 interface as its only I/O. USB 3 (for lowest denominator compatibility), a SATA descendant, and Thunderbolt, would be ideal, but with how cheap some drives end up, it might just be a sole USB port for in/out.

    1. Re:More capacity, but what about I/O? by afidel · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Actually as areal density increases drives are getting faster, both it terms of streaming reads and average transfer time, it's only worst case performance that is not getting any better. Also the drive manufacturers aren't stupid, as physical density increases logical density isn't increasing as quickly because they are using a larger percentage of the physical bits for error correction meaning the logic BER should at worst remain constant.

      --
      There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
  3. Re:What's the useful limit? by mpetch · · Score: 5, Funny

    640TB

  4. Re:I don't get it. by atrain728 · · Score: 5, Informative

    The numbers the summary cites are Gbits per square inch. Meaning it's already been squared.

  5. Re:WOW by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    I must be a nerd, because my digital comic collection is bigger then my porn collection.

    For some people, those would be one and the same.

  6. Re:WOW by xQx · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Truecrypt.

    That's all I have to say on the matter.

  7. Re:WOW by MightyYar · · Score: 5, Funny

    I use Spousal Truecrypt. It's an unencrypted folder titled "Sports".

    --
    W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
  8. Re:WOW by NaughtyNimitz · · Score: 5, Funny

    Until your smart wife discovers your loot when she types "creampie" or "cup" in spotlight (or similar windows search engine)

  9. Re:I don't get it. by jsm300 · · Score: 5, Informative
    No, the article is quoting aureal density which is expressed in gigabits or terabits per square inch. The problem with the article is that it is combining data from various sources and misreading/misinterpreting the data (so what's new, this is Slashdot after all).

    First, the summary above says that Seagate will produce a 60 Tb drive by 2016. That is not true. Seagate has said they will produce a drive with "up to" 60 Tb of capacity (30-60 TB) by the end of the decade. This is based on the theoretical limits of HAMR technology, which are projected to be in the 5-10 Tbits/sq. inch. range. Current 4TB drives are made with platters that have a density of around 650 Gbits/sq. in., so the math works (10Tb/.65Tb is approximately 15x).

    The other part of the article is talking about what the maximum density is likely to be over the timeframe from now to 2016 using PMR technology and transitioning to something new like HAMR. PMR technology will top out at about 1Tbit/sq. inch, so anything over that will require something new like HAMR. that underlying article quotes 1.8 Tbit/sq. in in 2016, which may not be out of line with 5-10 Tbit/sq. in. by 2020 as a new technology like HAMR comes online.

    The two articles that I am basing the above on are:
    Seagate/HAMR article
    IHS/ISuppli article

  10. Re:WOW by Alter_3d · · Score: 5, Funny

    I use Spousal Truecrypt. It's an unencrypted folder titled "Sports".

    A friend of mine kept his porn folder on plain view. The folder title was "Uninstall Windows". The wife never looked inside.

  11. Re:I'm going to make a bet or three by Spodi · · Score: 5, Insightful

    And I bought 2x 2TB HDDs for less than half that. Your point? Why do some people have such a hard time understanding that not everyone cares about speed for all of their drives. My primary drive, sure, make that baby as fast as possible. But all I need there is 200 GB (85 GB at this time) since that just holds the OS and all programs I use. The rest - the multiple TBs of backups and media (music, movies, pictures), who cares how fast that is. Even the slowest HDDs are going to be able to play 1080p just fine. For the very rare occasions those drives bottleneck, I don't mind waiting. I'd rather spend the money upgrading everything else that bottlenecks far more often.