Shingled Magnetic Recording

[angry_geek]

http://m.seagate.com/tech-insights/...-smr-master-ti/?cmpid=emc-_-sppsmrarticle0911

This could be real interesting. Or it could be a horribly slow and unreliable mess. You decide and discuss. I've been wondering what we would see as platter density hits an insurmountable wall. Is this the final evolution in mechanical storage? A stopgap measure to get us through the next few years til solid state storage gets to where it should be?

 

[phaZed]

If it's true that in order to write the data in the "middle" of the disk it requires a read/rewrite of all of the shingles after the data.. that sounds like a lot of extra drive time and wasted time waiting for the drive to do this. I'm sure there is some measure implemented to combat this (perhaps a full size track every 1GB or something like that).

Neat idea non the less. I'll let a year go by and let Seagate consumers "test" this tech first

 

[angry_geek]

They're putting the tracks in "bands" so large sections don't have to be rewritten. It's still going to be a performance hit, though.

 

[phaZed]

Ah, I did miss the notation on the last graphic, "Band N".

I wonder if you will be able to select SMR vs. Standard - seems like it would be easy enough to do.