Posts

The Densest Digits

Higher Capacities And Lower Pricing – A Boon for Data Storage

 

"Hard Drive Repair" by William Warby

“Hard Drive Repair” by William Warby

 

With new tech, hard drive capacities are increasing and storage costs are lowering. Both Toshiba’s 5TB and HGST’s 6TB hard drives had a limited market release in February 2014. Since then more manufacturers introduced similar products leading to a welcomed downward shift in mechanical storage cost.
[one_third]

“Luggage (Re-edit)” by Rob Faulkner (CC BY 2.0)

“Luggage (Re-edit)” by Rob Faulkner (CC BY 2.0)

[/one_third]

Not to be beaten to the punch again, Seagate (in keeping with their previous announcements) supplied 8TB hard drives to select enterprise customers for testing with an expected general market release this quarter. And Seagate’s CEO Steve Luczo pledged 10TB drives available by or before the middle of 2015, with a target of 20TB drives by 2020.

These newest drives can offer much higher capacities (greater areal densities) thanks to technological developments. Seagate’s heat-assisted magnetic recording (HAMR) process uses a laser to preheat a drive platter location before storing data (changing the magnetic polarity.) Seagate’s Luczo indicated limited production of the 8 & 10TB hard drives would maintain higher pricing, though Seagate will likely continue to respond to market pressures.

 

The new developments in storage technology are welcomed news. As the availability of larger capacity hard drives and hybrid drives (mechanical drives combined with smaller NAND caching Solid State Drives) increases, storage pricing should continue to drop through next year.

 

Are your data storage and disaster recovery solutions solid and do they accommodate your future growth? Every business is different, and there’s no one-size-fits-all solution. To learn more contact RWA today and schedule your free IT health check.

 

 

Tubular Totality

The Tubes

Image: The Tubes by Kendrick Erickson (CC BY 2.0)

Underwater fibre optic cables currently carry approximately 99% of global telecommunications and data traffic. In addition to Internet services, many important things in our lives such as food, clothing, electronics, news, transportation, health care, banking and global commerce are directly or indirectly made possible by this technology.

Continual advances in data compression and transmission techniques ensure there is plenty of capacity for future growth. Despite this, and the substantial installation costs, new cables are regularly laid to provide redundancy for uninterrupted connectivity.

But did you ever wonder where the technicians tunnel these magic sea tubes which help transport your trucked Internet? The following updated 2014 submarine communications cable map by Teleogeography shows current and planned global oceanic Internet cable connections. It really is happening under the sea.

 

Data flow management, network administration, cabling, data storage and disaster recovery require expertise. Every business is different, and there’s no one-size-fits-all solution. To learn more contact RWA today and schedule your free IT health check.