Samsung releases hybrid HDD - bit-tech.net Forums

Da Dego · 8th Mar 2007, 14:36

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/2007/03...es_hybrid_HDD/

atanum141 · 8th Mar 2007, 14:43

sounds good.

airchie · 8th Mar 2007, 15:12

Looks wicked.
Looking forward to Raptor drives with this kinda tech.
Can you imaging a raptor for a couple of gigs of flash memory???
I'd buy that for a dollar (or more like $500

).

Typo:-- Fixed, thanks! - Da Dego

Veles · 8th Mar 2007, 15:59

Not just a raptor drive, a parallel perpendicular water holgraphic raptor drive

sinizterguy · 8th Mar 2007, 16:11

Awesome. Now I just need to sit back and wait until a 1 or 2 GB flash SATA 120 or 160gb one comes out.

randosome · 8th Mar 2007, 17:21

i actually watched a long song and dance about flash drives, and they look pretty interesting, except vista has to tell the HDD what to put in the flash memory (otherwise it just acts like a HDD)

Although they did demo the fact, if your not working on it, those hundreds of tiny read/writes that happen can just be buffered in the flash memory, so you can actually get the HDD spun down for like 90% of the time if you aren't doing anything

It will become much more interesting when they are a couple of GB though, not that you want to store the OS in nand, but the combination of big enough flash and ram will probably allow the HDD to sit idle

Although i do wonder about HDD life - drives last longest when they are on for sustained periods, so constantly starting and stopping the drive seems like a bad idea

riggs · 8th Mar 2007, 17:25

Sounds fantastic, and while the memory size is very small, this should start the ball rolling.

And an extra 30 minutes laptop power is always a good thing!

Ramble · 8th Mar 2007, 18:31

Nice.
I hope they're releasing a high performance one for us enthusiasts rather than a bunch of laptop drives.

Brooxy · 8th Mar 2007, 20:41

I don't think i'm going to shell out on one of these for a while, not until I'm able to get the entire OS on the flash section, and all my data on the rotary.

Still, as said before, it's nice to see the ball is now rolling

DXR_13KE · 8th Mar 2007, 21:05

let the ball roll...... and then buy a uber fast hard drive.

Crazyglue · 8th Mar 2007, 21:08

wow, that 128mb or 256mb of flash is pretty much worthless... why cant they just stick a 1gb stick or 2gb stick (like in thumb drives) in there and make it a awsome hdd, instead of a decent one.

Da Dego · 8th Mar 2007, 21:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by Crazyglue

wow, that 128mb or 256mb of flash is pretty much worthless... why cant they just stick a 1gb stick or 2gb stick (like in thumb drives) in there and make it a awsome hdd, instead of a decent one.

The technology is a LOT more complicated than that...and actually 128-256MB is far from worthless, as I explained in the article? I'm just curious how the system will manage what's on that portion and what isn't.

Paolo · 8th Mar 2007, 22:21

My only question would be how this affects the overall drive lifespan - has flash memory progressed beyond the point where it's life under constant read/write is comparable to the rotary part of the drive it's a cruicial part of?

Cheers,
Paul

Buzzons · 8th Mar 2007, 23:22

doesnt NAND have a finite amount of read/writes? if its continually cashing data it will surly hit this limit "quite" fast, in comparison to the life time of a standard hard drive -- can you replace the NAND in the disks ?

Emon · 9th Mar 2007, 07:06

Flash life has gotten a lot better. The drive can also balance the load of where the reads and writes occur. Samsung has a 32 GB all flash drive with an MBTF of 228 years.

randosome · 9th Mar 2007, 07:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by Da Dego

The technology is a LOT more complicated than that...and actually 128-256MB is far from worthless, as I explained in the article? I'm just curious how the system will manage what's on that portion and what isn't.

alot of the OS doesnt actually need to be used all the time, so you really dont need to put it all in NAND

Also, ontop of that the drive has to cache the files into nand memory anyway, so its just prefetching files better
Im wondering what the sweet spot will be where the drive doesnt have to spin up for long periods of time (assuming your not playing media) because the nand has all the data you need

sinizterguy · 9th Mar 2007, 09:03

With this drive in combination with a SD card or other flash memory storing any media I want to watch as well as offering ReadyBoost should increase the battery life on my laptop as it should allow the hdd to spin down.

airchie · 9th Mar 2007, 09:15

I imagine having the swap file in the cache of the HDD would help?
You could in theory set a system managed swap file to be stored in the cache and it would only be filled if needed...

How would this work in raid?
As your PC 'sees' the disks as one drive, would it still be able to access the nand on the drives?
Would you simply double the nand size or lose it alltogether?

randosome · 10th Mar 2007, 00:13

Quote:

Originally Posted by airchie

I imagine having the swap file in the cache of the HDD would help?
You could in theory set a system managed swap file to be stored in the cache and it would only be filled if needed...

its possible it will do this, it caches data that your likely to need, and all the writes while the HDD is spun down

if you want to find out what actually happens youd need to talk to MS, beacause its their software behind the scenes making this happen, Its called ReadyDrive

Edit:
Btw its hardly amazing samsung did this, i mean they just followed MS's specs im guessing, they didnt even have to write any software for it - their just the first to get a product out there

mctigger · 12th Mar 2007, 19:34

Been waiting a long time to see one like this being released, It will improve battery life in laptops by a considerable amount, but if they put in a biggar Flash memory, the prospects for high performance machines, increase rapidly!

Imagine Playing a high intensity game (can't think of one just now), with little to no load times!!! Awosome!

8th Mar 2007, 14:36	#1
Da Dego Brett Thomas Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: Cleveland, OH USA Posts: 3,906	Samsung releases hybrid HDD http://www.bit-tech.net/news/2007/03...es_hybrid_HDD/ __________________ "Frankly that seems overkill. iluvtrees2 arguing with spec is the intellectual equivalent of a bunny rabbit taking on a pissed-off lion." - Nexxo

8th Mar 2007, 14:43	#2
atanum141 I fapped to your post! Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: London Posts: 7,536	sounds good. __________________ Welcome to Thunderdome, B*tch XBL: atanum141

8th Mar 2007, 16:11	#5
sinizterguy Dark & Sinizter Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: London, UK Posts: 5,462	Awesome. Now I just need to sit back and wait until a 1 or 2 GB flash SATA 120 or 160gb one comes out. __________________ Nothing here. Go away and dont bother me.

8th Mar 2007, 17:25	#7
riggs ^_^ Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: Lincs. Posts: 1,643	Sounds fantastic, and while the memory size is very small, this should start the ball rolling. And an extra 30 minutes laptop power is always a good thing! __________________ Hell hath no fury like a hippo with a machine gun PSN ID: buster2006 Last edited by riggs; 8th Mar 2007 at 23:41.

8th Mar 2007, 18:31	#8
Ramble Ginger Nut Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Exeter, Devon/Wantage, Oxfordshire Posts: 5,234	Nice. I hope they're releasing a high performance one for us enthusiasts rather than a bunch of laptop drives. __________________ Kirk, Spock, McCoy, and Ensign Ricky are beaming down to the planet. Guess who's not coming back.

8th Mar 2007, 17:21	#6
randosome Banned Join Date: Sep 2006 Posts: 226	i actually watched a long song and dance about flash drives, and they look pretty interesting, except vista has to tell the HDD what to put in the flash memory (otherwise it just acts like a HDD) Although they did demo the fact, if your not working on it, those hundreds of tiny read/writes that happen can just be buffered in the flash memory, so you can actually get the HDD spun down for like 90% of the time if you aren't doing anything It will become much more interesting when they are a couple of GB though, not that you want to store the OS in nand, but the combination of big enough flash and ram will probably allow the HDD to sit idle Although i do wonder about HDD life - drives last longest when they are on for sustained periods, so constantly starting and stopping the drive seems like a bad idea

8th Mar 2007, 20:41	#9
Brooxy Powered by the PG Monkey... Join Date: Apr 2006 Posts: 1,246	I don't think i'm going to shell out on one of these for a while, not until I'm able to get the entire OS on the flash section, and all my data on the rotary. Still, as said before, it's nice to see the ball is now rolling __________________ Scorpion - Opteron 146 - 1GB RAM - 120GB Maxtor ATA133 HDD - 8x DVD-RW - 16x DVDROM - nVidia 7800 GTX Graphics - Gigabyte GA-K8N51GMF-9 Mobo - Undergoing Case Mod Phoenix - Toshiba A120 - 1.73 Celeron (Dothan) - 1GB RAM - 60GB HDD - ATi 200m Graphics Salamander - Intel Pentium III @ 733MHz - 256Mb RAM - Total HDD @ 80Gb

8th Mar 2007, 21:05	#10
DXR_13KE Madeira's banana is the best!!! Join Date: Sep 2005 Location: Madeira ; Portugal Posts: 6,469	let the ball roll...... and then buy a uber fast hard drive. __________________ *Renegade X - 0.40 Release!* <---- CLICK!

8th Mar 2007, 21:08	#11
Crazyglue Multimodder Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: Elmhurst, IL Posts: 183	wow, that 128mb or 256mb of flash is pretty much worthless... why cant they just stick a 1gb stick or 2gb stick (like in thumb drives) in there and make it a awsome hdd, instead of a decent one. __________________ Check out my water cooled Lan Box! Core2Duo E6300 @ 3.1ghz \| Gigabyte EP45T-UD3P \| 2x2GB OCZ Reaper 1066 \| 5-5-5-15 @ 1100mhz \| Sapphire HD 3870 512mb @ 825/1200 \| WD 200GB SATA, 500GB SATA, and seagate 1TB SATA \| PC Power and Cooling 750w single 60A rail

8th Mar 2007, 22:21	#13
Paolo Multimodder Join Date: Sep 2004 Location: Scotland Posts: 191	My only question would be how this affects the overall drive lifespan - has flash memory progressed beyond the point where it's life under constant read/write is comparable to the rotary part of the drive it's a cruicial part of? Cheers, Paul

8th Mar 2007, 23:22	#14
Buzzons Mod Master Join Date: Jul 2005 Posts: 2,086	doesnt NAND have a finite amount of read/writes? if its continually cashing data it will surly hit this limit "quite" fast, in comparison to the life time of a standard hard drive -- can you replace the NAND in the disks ?

9th Mar 2007, 07:06	#15
Emon Hypermodder Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: Cleveland, OH Posts: 672	Flash life has gotten a lot better. The drive can also balance the load of where the reads and writes occur. Samsung has a 32 GB all flash drive with an MBTF of 228 years.

9th Mar 2007, 09:03	#17
sinizterguy Dark & Sinizter Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: London, UK Posts: 5,462	With this drive in combination with a SD card or other flash memory storing any media I want to watch as well as offering ReadyBoost should increase the battery life on my laptop as it should allow the hdd to spin down. __________________ Nothing here. Go away and dont bother me.

12th Mar 2007, 19:34	#20
mctigger Supermodder Join Date: Feb 2007 Posts: 516	Been waiting a long time to see one like this being released, It will improve battery life in laptops by a considerable amount, but if they put in a biggar Flash memory, the prospects for high performance machines, increase rapidly! Imagine Playing a high intensity game (can't think of one just now), with little to no load times!!! Awosome!