Are hard drives dead? 8TB M.2 SSD

[derr12]

Depending on price, I see a great replacement for my spinning 8tb archive drives (which can be retired to my nas).

[McBUrn]

On 6/16/2020 at 12:32 AM, Dutch_Master said:

Linus showed a PCIe card not that long ago that could hold 4 M.2 drives. Provided you have enough PCIe 16x slots, large storage capacity in SSD is already here.

 

Mind, this particular device is a 2280 form factor. I wouldn't be surprised if 10 or even 12 TB NVMe SSDs will be launched before the end of the year in 22110 size. The next logical step would be to integrate the DRAM cache into the controller chip, which will increase in size but less then the now separate components take up space. This allows more real-estate on the PCB for extra Flash storage chips, increasing capacity or wear-levelling (and thus life-expectancy).

That was one of my comments on that video, anyone knows why pretty much only the 2280 form factor is used? Looks like they went for some research to reduce the chip size allowing for such a big storage on a small board while the 22110 would have required no changes to the existing parts available.

[Nicnac]

at some point hdds are going to become what tape drives are today

[Egg-Roll]

On 6/15/2020 at 6:21 PM, Caroline said:

8TB HDD lifespan: 10 years

8TB QLC SSD lifespan: 10 months

 

I know it's a clickbait title and all but come on

A: You clearly never used a consumer grade Seagate, WD Green, almost any 3TB drive... Or about 2-3 of my poor drives that don't fit the descriptions past, that were stuck in an abusive relationship with me  *DIE YOU STUPID 2TB GREEN, DIE!!!*

B: Who writes about 1800TB of data in 10 months on a single device? I know some likely will but how many actually will? Those who do likely can justify the cost (youtube, etc).

Your assumptions require a user to write, transfer/delete, and write again at 4GB a minute 24 hours a day for all 10 months. While possible with the speeds of even a hhd, stop downloading naughty videos you'll clearly never watch.

  

1 hour ago, Nicnac said:

at some point hdds are going to become what tape drives are today

Will that make tape drives obsolete tho? If not then hhds are f*cked. Which I doubt for both. To me only hhds that will eventually only be available are the ones 8TB and larger because ssds would have gotten to the equal pricing for all other sizes. I'm waiting for that day to happen tbh. Nearly/there for 1TB drives, that buying a 1TB ssd could be worth it for gamers with tiny libraries.

[Nicnac]

4 minutes ago, Egg-Roll said:

Will that make tape drives obsolete tho? If not then hhds are f*cked. Which I doubt for both. To me only hhds that will eventually only be available are the ones 8TB and larger because ssds would have gotten to the equal pricing for all other sizes. I'm waiting for that day to happen tbh. Nearly/there for 1TB drives, that buying a 1TB ssd could be worth it for gamers with tiny libraries.

I just wrote it like that not putting much thinking into it tbh. You're probably right about 8+ TB drives being the only relevant hdd sizes in the near future. I don't know enough about hdd technology to guess if the tech is maxed out or if there is still room for improvements. Maybe even more heads and taller stacks will be added? Maybe long term reliability and data integrity for archiving will be improved further? afaik tape drives are still superior in that sense. I can also see how hdds might find a place in between tape drives and ssd cache as another intermediate "cache" or something in archives.

[Egg-Roll]

1 hour ago, Nicnac said:

I just wrote it like that not putting much thinking into it tbh. You're probably right about 8+ TB drives being the only relevant hdd sizes in the near future. I don't know enough about hdd technology to guess if the tech is maxed out or if there is still room for improvements. Maybe even more heads and taller stacks will be added? Maybe long term reliability and data integrity for archiving will be improved further? afaik tape drives are still superior in that sense. I can also see how hdds might find a place in between tape drives and ssd cache as another intermediate "cache" or something in archives.

I think CMR drives (most drives today, technically) might be able to push 2TB/ platter in the coming years, beyond that other tech (not SMR, tho SMR might be implemented alongside) would be needed to improve density, both Seagate and WD are working on those tech. The issue is cost, air can go 6 platters w/o issues, anything else needs helium, or dark magic to work.

 

If hdds can get to a relatively low price, which I doubt, they have one benefit over tape, non-sequential writes. Now those who use tape likely don't care about that esp since they have almost no moving parts, plus the cheapest I've found (via 3rd party) on Amazon is basically $14 CAD/TB, drives go as low as $20ish if you are willing to yank them out of an enclosure. Depending how large of a backup solution one might need, the initial tape drive device could be cheaper still.

 

My only concern with SSDs is their one flaw, their "ticking time bomb" which is eventually the internals will fail, likely after specs, but still you might/will lose all data once dead, depending what dies. Where as hdds as long as it isn't a head crash you can, not to mention a well built/maintained drive will last nearly indefinitely.

 

Actually one could label each drive tech in current use:

The old grumpy thing that thinks it knows all and can't easily learn more: Tape drives

The middle age thing that keeps trying to look new and fancy, but keeps failing: HDDs

The one that thinks it is in keshas Die Young video: SSDs