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Are Hybrid Drives Finally Coming of Age

Objective Analysis
October 1, 2010
54 Pages - SKU: OJA2847829

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Hybrid Disk Drives, the combination of a standard hard disk drive and NAND flash, were introduced in 2007 to an unreceptive market, so why are they making a resurgence today? This technology, which was well conceived but poorly implemented in its first generation, has now been implemented correctly and promises to sweep the PC hard drive market. Objective Analysis' Hybrid Disk Drive study explains hybrid drive technical principals, its potential market, competing technologies, and how the NAND, PC, SSD, and HDD markets will all be impacted by this new twist on an old technology.

Additional Information

Are Hybrid Drives Finally Coming of Age?

Hybrid Disk Drives, the combination of a standard hard disk drive and NAND flash, were introduced in 2007 to an unreceptive market, so why are they making a resurgence today?

This technology, which was well conceived but poorly implemented in its first generation, has now been implemented correctly and promises to sweep the PC hard drive market.

Objective Analysis' Hybrid Disk Drive study explains hybrid drive technical principals, its potential market, competing technologies, and how the NAND market, the PC market, the SSD market, and the HDD market will all be impacted by this new twist on an old technology.

Readers will gain an understanding of all sides of the Hybrid Drive market, and will learn strategies to participate in the market.

Contents
Executive Summary
Introduction: Why Are Hybrid HDDs Needed?: Memory Hierarchy Gap; Why the Gap is Growing; Filling the Gap with DRAM; NAND Flash Prices Bring Changes; A New NAND Step in the Hierarchy; NAND SSDs Displace Enterprise HDDs; Adding NAND to the Storage Hierarchy
History of the Hybrid Drive: Early Stages; The HHDA; Samsung; Seagate; Vista Support; Rebirth of the Technology
What’s Different This Time?: Anatomy of a Hybrid Storage System; New Hybrids Use Internal Managers; What Does this Manager Do?
Hybrid Hard Disk Drive Architecture: Standard HDD Principals; DRAM HDD Caches; NAND HDD Caches; NAND’s Idiosyncratic Writes; Hybrid Drives: A NAND Cache in an HDD
Hybrid HDD Benefits: Faster Data Access; Reduced Power Consumption; Greater Shock Tolerance; Improved Reliability; Benefit Summary; A Case Study: The Seagate Momentus
Can a Hybrid Drive Deliver “Instant-On”?: Fast Boot Will Drive Demand
How Much Will It Cost?: How NAND Costs will Add to HDD Costs; Cost to the Consumer
Alternatives to Hybrid Drives: Standard Hard Disk Drives (HDDs); Larger DRAM; NAND Caches External to the HDD; Boot Drives; Paired SSD & HDD; Replacing the HDD with an SSD
Hybrid Drive Forecast: Hybrid HDD Forecast
Impact to the NAND Market: Hybrid Share of Total NAND Market
Summary
Methodology
Figures
Tables
Author: Jim Handy
Figures: Figure 1. The Gap in the Memory Hierarchy; Figure 2. The Gap Between DRAM and HDD is Growing; Figure 3. Filling the Speed Gap with DRAM; Figure 4. NAND Prices Have Dropped below DRAM's; Figure 5. NAND Fills the Gap between HDD and DRAM; Figure 6. Storage Hierarchy in a Typical Computing System; Figure 7. Components of a Hybrid Storage System; Figure 8. Elements of a Hard Disk Drive; Figure 9. PC Total Power Savings from Hybrid HDD; Figure 10. Momentus XT Performance Approaches SSD Performance; Figure 11. A Hybrid HDD with a Small Main Memory is Faster than an HDD with a; Large DRAM; Figure 12. Performance Improvement vs. Added Cost of All Options; Figure 13. Momentus XT Performance Depends on Use History (PCMark Vantage HDD; Scores); Figure 14. Services Loaded During the Bootstrap Start of Windows XP; Figure 15. SLC NAND Price per Gigabyte Forecast; Figure 16. Automatic Data Placement Greatly Outperforms Manual; Figure 17. SYSmark Scores for HDD, SSD, and Cached Systems; Figure 18. Hybrid HDD Unit Shipment Forecast; Figure 19. Optimistic/Pessimistic Forecasts for NAND Consumption in Hybrid Drives 51; Figure 20. Hybrid Share of Total NAND Market
Tables: Table 1. Status of Hybrid Drive’s Features; Table 2. Example Manual Data Placement Strategy for a Boot Drive; Table 3. Hybrid HDD Unit Shipments; Table 4. Forecast of Hybrid HDD Unit Shipments, Typical Size, and Manufacturing Cost; Table 5. Forecast of Hybrid HDD Unit Shipments, Typical Size, and Manufacturing Cost

Are Hybrid Drives Finally Coming of Age

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