Will
conventional electromechanical hard drives eventually become
extinct in the face of solid-state drives, or are other
technologies poised to move into the future?
Ironically, the
introduction and growth of semiconductor memory will actually
prolong the life of hard-disc drives by acting as a buffer between
the spinning physical disc and the host system.
The idea of cache
memory is certainly nothing new but adding several gigabytes of
high performance memory can reduce dependence on the spinning
media. It's also possible to include flash, RAM and platters on the
same drive -- effectively bringing tiered storage to the hard drive
itself. These tactics may extend drive technology another 10-15
years. Beyond that, the physical hard disc may eventually be pushed
out in favour of memory-only devices, as well as holographic
storage technologies.
Go back to the beginning of the
Disc Hardware FAQ Guide.
The changing
role of semiconductor memory on hard drives
First, we're
generally talking about two types of memory.
Flash memory is low cost and it retains data
when power is removed (non-volatile), but its performance is
also slow. Conventional RAM -- the "main memory" of your PC or
server -- is much faster, but it's a bit more expensive and
requires constant power. You need to be aware that these two
memory types are very different, but vendors may refer to both
as "solid-state memory," so consider what you're buying.
Memory has a huge part to play in future drive designs as both a
power-saving and performance-boosting tactic. For example, we'll
likely see laptops with hybrid drives offering flash memory so that
the laptop can boot without actually spinning the hard drive. We're
also seeing high-performance disc drives with DDR RAM. Texas Memory
Systems can package 1
terabyte of solid-state memory in a 24U
cabinet. Flash and RAM memory prices continue to fall, so hybrid
and solid-state drives will become more economical into the
future.
Go back to the beginning of the
Disc Hardware FAQ Guide.