Why Intel and WD don't make a partnership for a SSHD?

[Bersekz]

So I have to switch my PS3 HDD because it doesn't have enough space, and while looking at the possible solutions, I came across the Seagate FireCuda. I remembered about the WD SSHD which got discontinued and thought why we can't still have one of these solutions that is both reliable (FireCuda aren't, just look at Amazon reviews or forums/videos) and cheap while having everything in one single package? Because there are still scenarios like gaming consoles, where you can't attach SSD + HDD separately because you got only one slot.

 

So I thought, what about if we combine Intel Optane 16/32GB that currently have (almost) no sense to exist on the market with WD 1-4TB HDDs? That would be a great combo in my opinion, and could sell really well expecially for the gaming consoles market.

 

What do you think?

[Sakkura]

Intel and WD are competitors in the storage space; Intel's been making NAND with Micron, competing against the NAND WD makes with Toshiba.

 

Optane/3DXPoint is expensive and even if the companies were on friendly terms, the price Intel would charge would wipe out any profit margin for WD.

[Defunct Lizard]

An "SSHD" is called a hybrid drive.

 

(By the way)

[porina]

It probably comes down to cash. Optane is still at a price premium per GB compared to regular flash. High end solution would be just to get a big SSD. I know, it hurts to think about those at TB scale but it is attainable.

 

I have tried Seagate SSHDs over the years. No reliability problems, but I can't say I notice any difference in performance over a regular HD. I'd rather get a straight 7200rpm HD if I care more about capacity than absolute performance.

 

1 minute ago, Sakkura said:

the price Intel would charge would wipe out any profit margin for WD.

or make the end product so expensive, it would be a hard sell.

[Bersekz]

14 minutes ago, Sakkura said:

Optane/3DXPoint is expensive and even if the companies were on friendly terms, the price Intel would charge would wipe out any profit margin for WD.

Where I live prices are as follow: WD Blue 1TB 45€, WD Black 1TB 75€, FireCuda 1TB 60€, Optane 16GB 35€. Even if we were to roughly sum WD Blue 1TB + Optane 16GB costs, I would be definitely fine paying a bit higher price than a WD Black for much higher performance and a more silent disk, all in one box.

[DEST98]

personal opinion

hdd is becoming obsolete by the day since ssd technology is growing so fast

even storage wise ssd is starting or even already surpassed hdd on how much data can be stored per drive

with this trend the only pro you can get from using a hdd in the future might be reliability and reliability only

so theres practically no point developing the sshd especially for the consumer market

[Bersekz]

3 minutes ago, DEST98 said:

personal opinion

hdd is becoming obsolete by the day since ssd technology is growing so fast

even storage wise ssd is starting or even already surpassed hdd on how much data can be stored per drive

with this trend the only pro you can get from using a hdd in the future might be reliability and reliability only

so theres practically no point developing the sshd especially for the consumer market

Still, a 1TB 860 EVO costs 200€, which is much more than 60€ for the 1TB FireCuda.

[DEST98]

2 minutes ago, Bersekz said:

Still, a 1TB 860 EVO costs 200€, which is much more than 60€ for the 1TB FireCuda.

true 

but try remembering how much a gig cost last year and how much per gig cost now

and in another year or two i wouldnt be surprises ssd having the same price per gig as a hdd

spending huge amount of money developing and producing a product that may not even last over a year isnt really smart dont you think?

 

[EsaT]

2 minutes ago, DEST98 said:

and in another year or two i wouldnt be surprises ssd having the same price per gig as a hdd

spending huge amount of money developing and producing a product that may not even last over a year isnt really smart dont you think?

If you're talking about QLC Flash wouldn't trust it to store anything for long time without power.

It's semi-analog storage needing to distinguish between freaking 16 charge states to avoid data corruption.

That leaves very little room for charge to deteriorite/leak.

 

And for big HDDs price per TB is near 30€.

Because of all fixed electronical and mechanical stuff price of small HDDs isn't competitive per capacity.

[DEST98]

1 hour ago, EsaT said:

If you're talking about QLC Flash wouldn't trust it to store anything for long time without power.

It's semi-analog storage needing to distinguish between freaking 16 charge states to avoid data corruption.

That leaves very little room for charge to deteriorite/leak.

 

And for big HDDs price per TB is near 30€.

Because of all fixed electronical and mechanical stuff price of small HDDs isn't competitive per capacity.

I think we're getting a little off topic here

But makers provide 3 to 5 years(if I'm not wrong) of warranty for a reason right ?

And in a consumer point of view it practically meant this thing would work for at least 3to5 years without problem

Data corruption wise I doubt it'll happen that fast before your next boot

But don't get me wrong hdd for me I think is still a better long term drive than a SSD

Next In terms of capacity hdd is reaching it's limit while SSD still has space to grow (this part I may be wrong but I don't think I am)

 

[Stefan Payne]

8 hours ago, Bersekz said:

So I have to switch my PS3 HDD because it doesn't have enough space, and while looking at the possible solutions,

For the PS3 you need 1TB at most, and also 500GB is huge for most games.

However the advantage of an SSD in a PS3 is almost non existant.

I had an SSD inside and even with Installing stuff it wasn't much faster.

Probably because Sony did some similar shit as with the PS4 and used USB to SATA Converters. And thus you can save your money on the HDD and just get a random one of the size you want.

 

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Because there are still scenarios like gaming consoles, where you can't attach SSD + HDD separately because you got only one slot.

Yes you can, though its a bit complicated and it doesn't make any sense for the PS3.

For the PS4 it makes sense to use an external USB 3.0 SSD for stuff that needs longer to load...

 

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So I thought, what about if we combine Intel Optane 16/32GB that currently have (almost) no sense to exist on the market with WD 1-4TB HDDs? That would be a great combo in my opinion, and could sell really well expecially for the gaming consoles market.

 

What do you think?

I think you should read up on what the PS3 actually supports. And what makes sense. IIRC the PS3 doesn't support HDDs over 2TB or something like that or even less than that, last time I checked. So you shouldn't waste your money on stuff that doesn't even works.

 

While it is possible to use an SSD inside a Playstation 3, my experience with that were pretty bad. Or rather no noticable performance difference between the HDD and SSD, even when doing the Installing stuff with downloaded games.

 

So frankly I don't see the point in anything other than a 5400rpm HDD for a Playstation 3...

 

Right now I have a 500GB Seagate inside though haven't used it much since then. Before I put my 500GB Samsung EVO 500 inside but even then I didn't notice a big difference to the SSD and the new 500GB (7mm) Drive at all...

[Bersekz]

1 hour ago, Stefan Payne said:

I think you should read up on what the PS3 actually supports. And what makes sense. IIRC the PS4 doesn't support HDDs over 2TB or something like that or even less than that, last time I checked. So you shouldn't waste your money on stuff that doesn't even works.

I think you should get some more information before you speak, because you wrote a lot of bullshit honestly. First of all, it is OBVIOUS that the PS4 supports 2TB, otherwise why SONY itself would make a 500 million limited edition with 2TB of storage? https://blog.us.playstation.com/2018/08/09/introducing-the-500-million-limited-edition-ps4-pro-commemorating-500-million-systems-sold/

 

Second thing, the max storage you can go is 8TB, well beyond what you thought: https://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2017/02/03/the-ps4-now-supports-external-hard-drives-up-to-8-tb/#4192935632a7 And yes, if 8TB 2.5" HDD were a thing nowadays, you could use that internally, but the greatest storage you can get for now with that form factor is the 4TB Samsung 860 EVO.

 

And the limit for the PS3 is exactly 1.75GB, so please check your facts since I was talking about 1TB HDD for the whole time when considering with what HDD to switch the stock one. Also, how can you say you don't notice any differences? You must be clearly blind for saying that, because I can clearly tell the difference since the FireCuda was showed for the first time at CES 2013:

 

[Stefan Payne]

11 minutes ago, Bersekz said:

I think you should get some more information before you speak, because you wrote a lot of bullshit honestly. First of all, it is OBVIOUS that the PS4 supports 2TB,

Yes, I misspoke and meant the PS3. For that there are many people claiming that its somewhere around 1,5-1,75TB the Maximum.

And I already have a 2TB Drive in my PS4 PRO myself.

 

Quote

And the limit for the PS3 is exactly 1.75GB,

Wich is what I was talking about. So before insulting people, you should consider if they just made a simple error and meant something different.

 

 

Quote

FireCuda was showed

Was shown...

 

11 minutes ago, Bersekz said:

And please, don't say it makes no difference,

I never said that it makes no difference, I said that the difference isn't as big as it should be or you'd expect from your experience with the PC.

Its a couple of seconds here and there, for real console games. But nothing that really warrants the premium of an SSD inside the PS3. A modern 2,5" HDD is more than enough for it as something else is limiting the drive performance other than the drive.

 

The SSD is a bit faster but not by that margin you'd expect from a PC, so the only advantage is the noise.

 

That you wouldn't play Dragon Age or any other Multi Plattform Game on the PS3 should be obvious as the games just look soo much better on PC than on PS3.

 

 

And since we're talking about a PS3, a 500GB Drive is enough for like 20-30 games, depending on the Game as there aren't many over 10GB.

 

So if you don't believe me, try it yourself with an SSD.

 

And for the Video: You know its cheated as an SSHD only benefits you when it has to load something multiple times. But when do you do such stuff in a Console? 

Never would be my guess.

Except if you are dying at the same place over and over again.

[Bersekz]

PS4 has much higher bandwidth than PS3 so the speed increase wouldn't be as much noticeable, but I played many games on PS3 that have HORRIBLE loading times, like Folklore, Ninja Gaiden Sigma, Drakengard 3 and many others where moving through the menus and maps was just an infinite pain with the stock HDD, it's way slower than it should be, in some games you even get stuttering and fps drops.

 

Anyway, to answer to your question about why you need so much storage, I can easily tell you not even 2TB are enough space if you like to make backups of every game in your collection and keep them on the HDD instead of using discs.

[Stefan Payne]

4 hours ago, Bersekz said:

but I played many games on PS3 that have HORRIBLE loading times, like Drakengard 3 and many others where moving through the menus and maps was just an infinite pain with the stock HDD, it's way slower than it should be, in some games you even get stuttering and fps drops.

Either your HDD is dying, your PS3 has issues or the HDD is fragmented as hell.

 

I have Drakengard as well and no issues navigating, Loadtimes are not that bad but its also one of the first things I've installed on my PS3 Slim. (and I also purchased the Japanese Voice Option).

 

Quote

Anyway, to answer to your question about why you need so much storage, I can easily tell you not even 2TB are enough space if you like to make backups of every game in your collection and keep them on the HDD instead of using discs.

Well, I only have a couple of games I've bougt and the Rest is PSN Plus Stuff, but still with all those, I don't even have 500GB Used.

 

So with what you're saying it sounds like your Problem might be fragmentation and a new drive should solve that Problem.

 

Or your HDD is as good as dead...

[JoostinOnline]

13 hours ago, Defunct Lizard said:

An "SSHD" is called a hybrid drive.

 

(By the way)

They're called both.

 

(By the way)

[Stefan Payne]

5 hours ago, Bersekz said:

Anyway, to answer to your question about why you need so much storage, I can easily tell you not even 2TB are enough space if you like to make backups of every game in your collection and keep them on the HDD instead of using discs.

What PS3 do you have? Fat, Slim or Super Slim?

Because in the End there is only one viable solution for you and that is to misuse the PS3 Drive Bay as a Hot Swap mount and swap the drive depending on the games you like to play, as the PS3 only supports drives up to ~1,5TB.

With that you can have everything installed on Harddrives...

 

You can get the mounting you need for your PS3 in the Bay...

So with that you could for example use a 1,5TB Drive for your normal games and if you really want to you can grab an SSD for the games with the long load times, though the PS3 can't do much with the SSD...

[Bersekz]

18 hours ago, Stefan Payne said:

What PS3 do you have? Fat, Slim or Super Slim?

Because in the End there is only one viable solution for you and that is to misuse the PS3 Drive Bay as a Hot Swap mount and swap the drive depending on the games you like to play, as the PS3 only supports drives up to ~1,5TB.

With that you can have everything installed on Harddrives...

 

You can get the mounting you need for your PS3 in the Bay...

So with that you could for example use a 1,5TB Drive for your normal games and if you really want to you can grab an SSD for the games with the long load times, though the PS3 can't do much with the SSD...

I have about 3TB of files on PC stored as ISO backups of my PS3 games, I usually transfer them to the PS3 via FTP with ethernet cable, but now I can't keep many games, about 15-20 with the 320GB stock HDD and it's already full (some games like GOW3 take really a lot of space). My dream would be to stop having them on the PC and keep the whole collection on the PS3, but that isn't possible of course without going with an external drive, unless I drop one grand for the 4TB 860 EVO, which would be a freaking overkill solution.

 

Anyway, my only real issue is a huge trusting problem with Seagate. I know that performance wise the FireCuda 1TB is the best bang for the buck, but after reading every year all the failures of their HDDs at Backblaze and considering the amount of bad reviews they got on Amazon (I perfectly know I'm biased on this side), I can't really put faith into them. Meanwhile I never had any issues with WD, and the only drive I had with reallocated sectors was promptly replaced because still under warranty and I've never lost any data with them. Just, the WD10SPZX WD Blue is 10€ cheaper but somewhat slower because it lacks the NAND cache and the WD Black 1TB HDD costs double the WD Blue. Moreover, I compared the performance with the stock 320GB HDD of my PS3 Slim, and it's already 80% faster!

 

I'm overthinking way too much about such simple choice... I guess those 8GB of flash memory aren't really that great as I think, way too less to make a big difference, and anyway I should be reloading the same thing over and over which in normal scenario I don't do in the kind of games I play.

[Stefan Payne]

31 minutes ago, Bersekz said:

I have about 3TB of games on PC stored as ISO backups of my PS3 games, I usually transfer them to the PS3 via FTP with ethernet cable,

That sounds like CFW, does it not?

That should support external drives, doesn't it?

 

And that also explains the shitty loadtimes you have as you always delete and copy them. That causes fragmentation and your loadtimes are in the toilet.

 

But there also isn't an easy solution for you.

The only thing I could think of is to get another PS3 and put either a 1,5TB or even try a 2TB Drive in each. And then sort them by Genere or whatever you want...

 

The second best solution is to get a 500GB or maybe 1TB SSD and put them inside the PS3 and get a PS3 Storage Drive for the PC.

As the SSD is immune to fragmentation (or rather it doesn't matter for the performance) it might be a better solution...

 

31 minutes ago, Bersekz said:

Anyway, my only real issue is a huge trusting problem with Seagate.

Well, there are two possibilitys:

a) risk it and get a Seagate drive, but keep backups just in case

b) not trusting seagate and only getting a Toshiba L200 drive instead.

 

31 minutes ago, Bersekz said:

I know that performance wise the FireCuda 1TB is the best bang for the buck,

I disagree because SSHD only work when you load the stage you are at again, its a form of cache, that only buffers what is read from the drive..

It doesn't work for the first time. So to be frank, I think that those SSHDs are rather useless in a console. Except for Dark Souls (or Bloodborne on the PS4) of course....

 

So I'd rather go with the normal HDD instead as you probably won't start the day loading the same shit over and over again but to play different games. And in that case the SSHD just doesn't work.

 

31 minutes ago, Bersekz said:

but after reading every year all the failures of their consumer HDD (not enterprise lineups like IronWolf) at Backblaze and considering the amount of bad reviews they got on Amazon

The Blackblaze stuff is useless for you because they talk about 3,5" drives, you need a 2,5" one. So those can't have anything to do with each other because of that.

31 minutes ago, Bersekz said:

(I perfectly know I'm biased on this side), I can't really put faith into them. Meanwhile I never had any issues with WD, and the only drive I had with reallocated sectors was promptly replace because still in warranty and I've never lost any data with them. Just, the WD10SPZX WD Blue is 10€ cheaper but somewhat slower because it lacks the NAND cache and the WD Black 1TB HDD costs as much as double the WD Blue. I'm overthinking way too much about such simple choice...

Yes you are.

 

To make it simple:
If you don't install and delete stuff on a regular basis -> HDD

If you do instal and delete stuff on a regular basis -> SSD preferred due to Fragmentation. And since the PS3 doesn't come with a defragmentation tool, your only choice is to delete everything...

 

 

So you should just get the 1TB drive...

 

[Bersekz]

54 minutes ago, Stefan Payne said:

And since the PS3 doesn't come with a defragmentation tool, your only choice is to delete everything...

Sorry but, as far as I know, Linux doesn't need any defragmentation. That's why on Android you never defragment. And the PS3 OS is based on Linux as well.

 

Anyway, I'll get the WD Blue 1TB for my piece of mind and also because it's the cheapeast.

[Stefan Payne]

14 minutes ago, Bersekz said:

Sorry but, as far as I know, Linux doesn't need any defragmentation.

That's a fairy tale.

Where ever you have Harddrives and delete stuff, there is fragmentation.

 

Fragmentation is like you write in a (Paper) notebook some things and then you remember that you don't need certain things and erase it (with an erazer) and then you write other stuff there. 

 

And that is how the fragmentation happens.

The solution is simple but not always possible: Just don't delete stuff then you won't have fragmentation

14 minutes ago, Bersekz said:

That's why on Android you never defragment. And the PS3 OS is based on Linux as well.

Android is installed on Flash.

and on Flash Memory you do not need defragmentation programms. 

But PS3 isn't based on Linux, its based on BSD. That's for legal reasons.

And contary what people tell you, on rotational, mechanical storages like a Harddrive where you don't have access to everyting on it at every time (like it is the case with electronic storage like Flash Memory), you have fragmentation. That's just the way it is.

 

Its like this:

 

and you see the Problem right now with Fragmentation.

Its an inherent problem with Harddrive.

 

While it also happens on SSDs, due to the way they work, its irrelevant (well, more or less. That's what TRIM is for).

 

PS: A shame that Bill didn't do a Video in a long long time...

 

14 minutes ago, Bersekz said:

Anyway, I'll get the WD Blue 1TB for my piece of mind and also because it's the cheapeast.

Yeah, have fun with it.

 

And remember to get the other download file at the buttom of the page, for new installations. The normal won't work.

 

Replacing the HDD is a bit of a pain in the original PS3...

In the 12GB Super Slim its a piece of cake though you'd have to make a backup of the Flashmemory...