Hard Disk Capacity Slightly Expanded In 2023 Amid SSD Competition
Blocks&Files, Friday, December 15,2023
The main storage technology themes in 2023 were capacity increases in disk and the possibility of SSDs replacing them. Dual actuator technology underwhelmed.
We started 2023 with Western Digital shipping 22 TB conventional magnetic recording (CMR) disk drives and 26 TB shingled magnetic media recording (SMR) drives with zones of overlapping write racks. These are 3.5-inch nearline drives spinning at 7,200 rpm. Seagate caught up with WD in April, announcing its own 22 TB HDD, the Ironwolf Pro, and Toshiba reached the 22 TB level in September with the MG10F.
All these 22 TB drives have 10 platters and the enclosures are helium-filled.