At the inaugural conference of the Data Storage Professional Committee (hereinafter referred to as the Data Storage Committee) of the China Electronics Standardization Association, held recently in Beijing, Ni Guangnan stated that the future market space for data storage is enormous. He emphasized the importance of balancing computing power and storage capacity, and pushing for a storage revolution in the market by replacing traditional hard disk drives (HDDs) with advanced solid-state drives (SSDs).
With the technological maturity and decreasing cost of solid-state drives in recent years, SSDs seem poised to replace HDDs. However, some opinions argue that mechanical hard drives will still occupy an important position in the storage market for the next few years. The CEO of storage software company Scality pointed out that since the price of flash memory used in SSDs remains high, even QLC flash memory does not suffice. In terms of price per GB, mechanical hard drives still have a 5-7 times advantage over flash memory, and by 2028, this advantage will still be 4-5 times.
Particularly, data shared by Trendfocus indicates that in the first quarter of 2024, 29.7 million mechanical hard drives were shipped globally, with a 3% quarter-on-quarter growth. It seems that the mechanical hard drive market is recovering. Has the development of mechanical hard drives reached its limit? Where will they continue to shine in the future?
01. Mechanical Hard Drives (HDD) and Solid-State Drives (SSD)
Hard drives, as an indispensable storage device in computers, play an important role in data storage and retrieval. With technological advancements, the variety of hard drives has increased to meet different user needs. There are two types of hard drives: mechanical hard drives (Hard Disk Drive, HDD) and solid-state drives (SSD).
A mechanical hard drive is a traditional hard disk, primarily consisting of components such as: disks, magnetic heads, disk spindles and control motors, head controllers, data converters, interfaces, and caches.
The magnetic head moves along the radius of the disk, and with the high-speed rotation of the disk at thousands of revolutions per minute, the head can locate the designated position on the disk for read/write operations. Information is written to the disk via electromagnetic flow, which alters the polarity of the magnetic surface. The data can be read in the opposite way. As a precise device, dust is the enemy of hard drives, so the air entering the drive must be filtered.
All the disks in a mechanical hard drive are mounted on a rotating axis, with each disk placed parallel to the others. Each disk surface has a magnetic head, and the distance between the head and the disk is only 0.1μm to 0.5μm, with the highest levels reaching 0.005μm to 0.01μm. All the heads are connected to a head controller that manages their movements. The read/write speed of mechanical hard drives depends on the motor speed, as the motor drives the disk to spin at high speeds for the head to locate and perform read/write operations.
A solid-state drive (SSD), also known as a solid-state disk or solid-state drive, is a type of hard drive made from an array of solid-state electronic storage chips. The term “solid-state” is derived from the use of solid capacitors in Taiwan’s English terminology. An SSD consists of control units and storage units (such as FLASH chips and DRAM chips).
SSDs are the same as traditional hard drives in terms of interface standards, functionality, and usage methods, and they are generally the same size and shape as traditional hard drives (though newer forms like U.2 and M.2 SSDs differ in size and shape from SATA mechanical hard drives).
Since SSD technology is different from traditional hard drive technology, many new storage device manufacturers have emerged. Manufacturers only need to purchase NAND flash chips, pair them with appropriate control chips, and write the main controller code to produce an SSD.
SSDs have several advantages over traditional mechanical hard drives, including faster read/write speeds, lighter weight, lower energy consumption, and smaller size. However, they also have some clear disadvantages. Although IDC believes SSDs have become mainstream in the storage market, their prices remain high, storage capacities are still relatively low, and data recovery can be difficult in case of hardware failure. Moreover, some argue that the durability (lifetime) of SSDs is relatively short.
02. Major Manufacturers and Technological Development of Mechanical Hard Drives
Currently, compared to the SSD market, the mechanical hard drive market is relatively simple, with three major manufacturers: Western Digital, Seagate, and Toshiba. The rapid development of SSDs has caused significant disruption to the mechanical hard drive market. On the one hand, Seagate, Western Digital, and Toshiba have already ventured into the SSD business, while on the other hand, they are also exploring new technological routes for mechanical hard drives.
- Seagate: Founded in 1979, Seagate is the world’s largest manufacturer of hard drives, disks, and read-write heads, headquartered in Scotts Valley, California, USA. Seagate has factories in the U.S., Mexico, Malaysia, China, Thailand, and Singapore, among other locations. The U.S. factory mainly focuses on product research and development, as well as the manufacturing of head wafers and disks. The factory in Mexico handles refurbished products worldwide, while the Malaysian factory focuses on cutting head wafers. The Thai and Chinese factories handle assembly of hard drives, and the Singapore factory is dedicated to producing enterprise-class hard drives. Seagate is also the first company to manufacture 5.25-inch hard drives specifically for desktop computers. In 2021, Seagate unveiled a 3.5-inch mechanical hard drive with PCIe NVMe interface at the Open Compute Project summit.
Seagate has also launched Heat-Assisted Magnetic Recording (HAMR) technology, a major breakthrough for increasing hard drive capacity. HAMR allows for higher data storage density without increasing the number of physical disks, reducing material costs, vibration, and energy consumption. In Seagate’s HAMR technology, data is stored in magnetic positions, with a higher bit density than traditional Perpendicular Magnetic Recording (PMR) hard drives.
- Western Digital (WD): Founded in 1970 and headquartered in California, Western Digital acquired Hitachi Global Storage Technologies (HGST) for $4.3 billion in 2011. To meet market demand, Western Digital introduced the “My Passport” mobile hard drive in 2008, featuring a unique stacked design that made the casing compact and lightweight. The stacked design allowed the disks to be tightly packed, improving the hard drive’s shock resistance and heat dissipation, ensuring stability during long-term heavy use.
- Toshiba: Founded in 1875 in Japan, Toshiba is a major semiconductor manufacturer and a global leader in electromechanical manufacturing. Toshiba was the first to install HDDs in cars for storing digital content and launched the world’s first automotive-grade HDD in 1997. In 2000, Toshiba became the first company to successfully introduce a 1.8-inch hard drive, designed for Apple’s iPod. In 2004, Toshiba became the first to launch hard drives using Perpendicular Magnetic Recording (PMR) technology. Toshiba’s FC-MAMR (Microwave-Assisted Magnetic Recording) technology is another major innovation that uses microwave assistance to reduce the difficulty of writing to magnetic media, further increasing storage density and capacity. Toshiba’s 18TB hard drives launched in 2021 incorporated this technology.
In the past year, Western Digital, Seagate, and Toshiba have each launched 28TB SMR stacked hard drives aimed at data centers. Recently, Western Digital pushed the limits of SMR stacked hard drives, achieving record capacities of 30TB and 32TB.
03. The Future of Mechanical Hard Drives
Solid-state drives (SSDs) have become the new favorite for many due to their high-speed read/write capabilities. However, mechanical hard drives (HDDs), which may seem “old-fashioned,” have not quickly phased out as many expected. In the mainstream market, mechanical hard drives under 4TB have indeed gradually been replaced by SSDs. This range was once the most popular for consumers, so the decline in sales of mechanical hard drives is not surprising. However, in the market for high-capacity hard drives above 4TB, mechanical hard drives still show irreplaceable advantages. On the one hand, SSDs in the 4TB and above range are expensive, causing many users to hesitate. On the other hand, for users needing large storage capacities, SSDs cannot match mechanical hard drives in terms of capacity and cost.
In this context, mechanical hard drive manufacturers are continuing to innovate, working to increase both the capacity and performance of their drives. This allows mechanical hard drives to continue to have a significant presence in certain fields.
Artificial Intelligence (AI): With the rapid rise of generative AI, the need for large-capacity storage has become more critical. In AI applications, vast amounts of historical data and model parameters need to be stored long-term. These data are typically accessed infrequently but require large storage capacities. Mechanical hard drives, with their high capacity and low cost, are ideal for cold data storage. For instance, checkpoint data generated during model training may not be accessed frequently months later and can be stored on mechanical hard drives to reduce storage costs.
As AI increases computing power demands, the prices of GPUs and memory are rising, which indirectly raises the cost of SSDs. In contrast, the price of mechanical hard drives remains relatively stable, and per TB, mechanical hard drives are expected to be more cost-effective than SSDs in the next one to two years, making them more competitive in terms of total cost of ownership (TCO).
Security: In the security industry, the market for SSDs and mechanical hard drives shows a contrasting trend. Due to cost considerations, the industry focuses on the application cost per GB. In scenarios with massive amounts of data, such as in security, SSD storage volume is often not enough.
Security surveillance systems typically require 24/7 operation, demanding stable and reliable storage devices. Mechanical hard drives excel in this area, providing long-term stable operation to ensure the continuity and integrity of monitoring data.
Cold Storage: SSDs cannot store data for long periods without power, which may lead to data loss. Mechanical hard drives have significant advantages in cold storage applications, meeting the needs for long-term data retention, reducing storage costs, and increasing data security and reliability.
Home Storage: More and more households are adopting NAS systems for home storage. NAS systems typically store large amounts of data, such as family photos, videos, music, and documents. Mechanical hard drives, with their large capacity, are well-suited to meet the storage needs of NAS systems. With ongoing technological advancements, mechanical hard drives with capacities of several tens of TB are already available, providing ample storage space for NAS systems.
With the increasing popularity of smart TVs and HD playback devices, the demand for home viewing of HD films continues to rise. Mechanical hard drives can store a large number of HD movies for convenient viewing at any time. Family photos are precious memories that need to be preserved, and mechanical hard drives offer enough storage space to back up family photos to prevent data loss. For music-loving families, mechanical hard drives can store a large amount of music files, creating a family music library that can be enjoyed at any time.
This potential demand has caught the attention of companies like Xiaomi, which has recently targeted the NAS market. Earlier, Huawei had already released home storage NAS products. NAS has become a key part of the smart home ecosystem, and mechanical hard drives are still commonly used as storage media in home storage systems.
According to market research firm QYR, the global home NAS device market was valued at 2.44 billion yuan in 2023, and is expected to maintain a compound annual growth rate of 41.99%, reaching 28.93 billion yuan by 2030. Smaller market sizes often mean lower competition, greater development potential, and lower concentration, making it an ideal market for new brands to enter. The market’s potential may be the key factor that led Xiaomi to enter the NAS industry.
Leveraging the appeal of smartphone manufacturers in the consumer sector, the home NAS market size is likely to expand, especially with Xiaomi’s experience in creating hit products. This will further stimulate the demand for mechanical hard drives.
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