The story of two millimeters
This post is about a 2.5-inch 2.5-inch hard drive: these are the most recent models (starting from last year) that have begun to appear in laptops from various manufacturers. The change, compared to standard-height drives of 9.5 millimeters, seems to be small, but it caused a lot of emotions for the most advanced users. First of all, because of the impossibility (looking ahead, I will say temporary) to provide a storage of more than 500 gigabytes in my laptop. Indeed, is there any point? Well, if the new models had a thickness of three millimeters and even fit into the tablets. And then - some two millimeters.
Therefore, in the blog of the company HGST, the largest manufacturer of seven millimeters, I would like to pay special attention to such hard drives. “Minus two millimeters” is not really a revolutionary change, but thin hard drives appeared on the market just in time. Already, thanks to them, more models with hybrid storage (SSD + HDD) are becoming available, providing both speed and volume, and simply - laptops with a fairly fast and economical hard drive. Such models are inexpensive (SSD, though cheaper, but still give a tangible markup), and do not require the owner to carry an external drive with them - in case you want to choose something from your own video library. Expecting in the comments an immoderate holivar “SSD vs. HDD”, I will begin with a brief insight into history.
')
Our size?
The entire modern computer history (after the truck no longer needed to transport one hard drive) is accompanied by drives of two main form factors - 3.5 inches (inherited from Floppy drives) for desktop computers and 2.5 for laptops. However, there were exceptions - for example, 5.25-inch hard disks that appeared in the early 80s and were revived for a while in the mid-90s. For laptops, one time was considered a 3-inch form factor - a compromise between volume and dimensions, which, however, did not take off. Hard drives with dimensions of 1.8 inches or less have disappeared quite recently - such a crumb can really be placed anywhere, except that small plates do not provide either a data transfer rate or volume.
Therefore - for mobile devices, the 2.5-inch hard drive was and remains the standard. However, why only for mobile? Similar hard drives are used in external drives (3.5-inch boxes still do not closely correspond to the concept of a “portable hard disk”), in game consoles and in corporate data storage systems. And this means that in research centers of all (now a few :) hard drive manufacturers, this format will receive no less, and maybe more attention, than the standard 3.5-inch models.
What does HGST offer?
Model Travelstar Z7K500 is currently available in versions of 250, 320 and 500 gigabytes. Common features for all versions are as follows:
Interface : SATA 3 6 GB / s
Data buffer size : 32 MB
With the speed of rotation of the spindle : 7200 revolutions per minute
Search time : 13 ms
Number of on / off cycles : 600,000
Power consumption in read / write mode : 1.8 W
Standby power consumption : 1.7 W
For a complete list of features, see a PDF on the HGST website .
All models have one data recording plate and are currently among the fastest notebook drives (more than 130 megabytes per second in a sequential read-write test). But even more important is not the speed, but the parameters of energy consumption. In read-write mode, the power consumption of the model is only 1.8 watts.
2 millimeters is a lot!
No, of course for monsters with a thickness of 8 centimeters, a thinner hard disk of weather will not do. But for ultrabooks - quite. According to Yandex.Market, at the time of preparing the text, 90 models of ultrabooks were available for sale in Russia, with a price tag of 18 to 40+ thousand rubles. The thickness of the models is from 17 to 21 millimeters. In such models, every millimeter in the account, so in about half of the cases only SSDs of up to 128 gigabytes are used (and the minimum price rises to 25 thousand rubles). In other cases, either a single hard drive or hybrid storage is used, providing both speed and volume, while maintaining minimum dimensions and weight. Among these models there are even 15-inch computers weighing 1.8 kilograms. And everyone who constantly carries a computer with him is well aware that it would be nice to reduce these parameters of laptops. Thin winchesters are one of the technologies that allow you to do this without forcing you to figure out how to turn off hibernation and the paging file in Windows (or otherwise nothing will fit :).
What's next?
Thin hard drives provide owners of ultrabooks and simply compact models with the opportunity not to limit themselves in the amount of stored data - within reasonable limits, but without the harsh limitations of a typical SSD of 128 gigabytes. Of course, now you can buy a laptop with an SSD for 750 or more gigabytes, but the price will be appropriate. The distribution of models with hybrid storage removes the question of speed. Moreover, such models as the Z7K500 also provide very fast data transfer to the hard disk and back, with speeds of over 120 megabytes per second on “large” files.
As a result, changing the height of the hard disk by only 2 mm - actually extends the life of hard drives. If it seems to someone that only solid state drives will remain a bit, then it is not so :) Moreover, even 7 millimeters is not the limit of possibilities. More recently, five-millimeter hard drives of up to 500 gigabytes were announced.
Competition SSD and HDD will continue, well, we can only use its fruits. Of all the available configurations for a laptop disk system, personally, the 80GB SSD and 500GB, permanently accessible “archive” with all the necessary files are the most beneficial for me. And for you?
Therefore, in the blog of the company HGST, the largest manufacturer of seven millimeters, I would like to pay special attention to such hard drives. “Minus two millimeters” is not really a revolutionary change, but thin hard drives appeared on the market just in time. Already, thanks to them, more models with hybrid storage (SSD + HDD) are becoming available, providing both speed and volume, and simply - laptops with a fairly fast and economical hard drive. Such models are inexpensive (SSD, though cheaper, but still give a tangible markup), and do not require the owner to carry an external drive with them - in case you want to choose something from your own video library. Expecting in the comments an immoderate holivar “SSD vs. HDD”, I will begin with a brief insight into history.
')
Our size?
The entire modern computer history (after the truck no longer needed to transport one hard drive) is accompanied by drives of two main form factors - 3.5 inches (inherited from Floppy drives) for desktop computers and 2.5 for laptops. However, there were exceptions - for example, 5.25-inch hard disks that appeared in the early 80s and were revived for a while in the mid-90s. For laptops, one time was considered a 3-inch form factor - a compromise between volume and dimensions, which, however, did not take off. Hard drives with dimensions of 1.8 inches or less have disappeared quite recently - such a crumb can really be placed anywhere, except that small plates do not provide either a data transfer rate or volume.
Therefore - for mobile devices, the 2.5-inch hard drive was and remains the standard. However, why only for mobile? Similar hard drives are used in external drives (3.5-inch boxes still do not closely correspond to the concept of a “portable hard disk”), in game consoles and in corporate data storage systems. And this means that in research centers of all (now a few :) hard drive manufacturers, this format will receive no less, and maybe more attention, than the standard 3.5-inch models.
What does HGST offer?
Model Travelstar Z7K500 is currently available in versions of 250, 320 and 500 gigabytes. Common features for all versions are as follows:
Interface : SATA 3 6 GB / sData buffer size : 32 MB
With the speed of rotation of the spindle : 7200 revolutions per minute
Search time : 13 ms
Number of on / off cycles : 600,000
Power consumption in read / write mode : 1.8 W
Standby power consumption : 1.7 W
For a complete list of features, see a PDF on the HGST website .
All models have one data recording plate and are currently among the fastest notebook drives (more than 130 megabytes per second in a sequential read-write test). But even more important is not the speed, but the parameters of energy consumption. In read-write mode, the power consumption of the model is only 1.8 watts.
2 millimeters is a lot!
No, of course for monsters with a thickness of 8 centimeters, a thinner hard disk of weather will not do. But for ultrabooks - quite. According to Yandex.Market, at the time of preparing the text, 90 models of ultrabooks were available for sale in Russia, with a price tag of 18 to 40+ thousand rubles. The thickness of the models is from 17 to 21 millimeters. In such models, every millimeter in the account, so in about half of the cases only SSDs of up to 128 gigabytes are used (and the minimum price rises to 25 thousand rubles). In other cases, either a single hard drive or hybrid storage is used, providing both speed and volume, while maintaining minimum dimensions and weight. Among these models there are even 15-inch computers weighing 1.8 kilograms. And everyone who constantly carries a computer with him is well aware that it would be nice to reduce these parameters of laptops. Thin winchesters are one of the technologies that allow you to do this without forcing you to figure out how to turn off hibernation and the paging file in Windows (or otherwise nothing will fit :).
What's next?
Thin hard drives provide owners of ultrabooks and simply compact models with the opportunity not to limit themselves in the amount of stored data - within reasonable limits, but without the harsh limitations of a typical SSD of 128 gigabytes. Of course, now you can buy a laptop with an SSD for 750 or more gigabytes, but the price will be appropriate. The distribution of models with hybrid storage removes the question of speed. Moreover, such models as the Z7K500 also provide very fast data transfer to the hard disk and back, with speeds of over 120 megabytes per second on “large” files.
As a result, changing the height of the hard disk by only 2 mm - actually extends the life of hard drives. If it seems to someone that only solid state drives will remain a bit, then it is not so :) Moreover, even 7 millimeters is not the limit of possibilities. More recently, five-millimeter hard drives of up to 500 gigabytes were announced.
Competition SSD and HDD will continue, well, we can only use its fruits. Of all the available configurations for a laptop disk system, personally, the 80GB SSD and 500GB, permanently accessible “archive” with all the necessary files are the most beneficial for me. And for you?
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/159771/
All Articles