“Solid state drives are one of the hot technologies of the day. However, ‘hotness’ and ‘the cloud’ aside, look for hard drives to maintain their importance for months to come. No, make that years to come,” Dennis Sellers reports for MacNews.
“Maximum areal densities in hard disk drives (HDD) are expected to more than double during the five-year period from 2011 to 2016, spurring continued growth for HDDs in storage-intensive applications such as video and audio systems, according to the iHS iSuppli research group,” Sellers reports. “HDD areal densities measuring data-storage capacities are projected to climb to a maximum 1,800 Gigabits (Gb) per square inch per platter by 2016, up from 744 Gb per square inch in 2011.”
Sellers reports, “HAMR technology is likely to lead the way in creating next-generation HDDs, even though satisfactory costs via HAMR comparable to those of PMR have yet to be seen. In theory, however, advanced technologies like HAMR could extend HDD areal density to a range spanning 5-10 Tb per square inch. The highest capacity for 3.5-inch HDDs could then reach 30TB to 60 TB, while the smaller and thinner 2.5- inch HDDs used in increasingly popular thinner notebooks could reach 10 to 20 TB. Now that’s some serious storage. And it makes solid state drives, despite their advantages, less desirable considering their high price and low storage capability.”
Much more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Once you experience the speed and silence of SSDs, you’ll never want to spin up a hard drive again. Like our MacBook Airs, our iMacs use SSDs for the system and apps for the soundless speed only SSDs can deliver. The 2TB hard drives are used only for media storage and Time Machine.
Related article:
Don’t buy a new Mac without an SSD or you’ll regret it – April 9, 2012