Google’s campaign for taller HDDs is a great idea (in theory)
Just recently, there was a white paper authored by Google staff titled “Disks for Data Centers”. In it, the authors called for a new HDD form factor that meets five key criteria. In summary, the paper questions the current HDD form factor and how changing some key...
SAS SSDs Continue to Thrive
TRENDFOCUS just recently published its CQ4 ’15 report, which included details for all SSD types and interfaces shipped in the final quarter of 2015. One thing that continues to be clear is the staying power of SAS SSDs. SAS SSDs have continued to show growth virtually...
HDD Units Fall in 2015, But Storage Capacity Shipped Grows to 538 Exabytes: TRENDFOCUS 2015-2020 Outlook and Analysis
HDD unit shipments dipped below 115 million in the fourth calendar quarter of 2015 due to weak PC sales and impact of SSD incursion in notebook computers. For the year, HDD sales were down 16.9% to 469 million units according to TRENDFOCUS’ CQ4 HDD Market Update....
Notebook Market Off to a Bad Start – The Worst is Almost Over, Or is It?
Notebook production by the top five ODMs were just released (slightly late due to the Lunar New Year holiday), and January’s totals were the lowest since TRENDFOCUS started tracking ODM output back in 2010. January’s volumes plummeted over 30% sequentially, and given...
TRENDFOCUS Publishes 4th Calendar Quarter NAND / SSD Report
SSD industry continues to see exceptional growth in virtually all segments. TRENDFOCUS has just released its latest NAND/SSD Quarterly update. In this latest report, covering CQ4 ’15 results and the updated long term forecast, all segments, both client and enterprise...
WDC & SanDisk Combined – Soon to be the Top Dog for all Storage Devices.
With the acquisition of SanDisk moving forward, WDC is on the verge of becoming the big boy on the block from a product portfolio and vertical integration perspective. They will have any and all HDD and SSD storage solutions one could want, including the NAND supply...
SMR HDDs are Coming to a Notebook PC Near You
While Seagate has been shipping HDDs with shingle magnetic recording (SMR) for a number of years in its external HDD products, 2016 is shaping up to be the year when the industry as a whole announces and ships mainstream OEM HDDs using the capacity boosting...
NAND Supply to Outpace True Demand – SSD Prices Continue Free Fall
Pending Q4’15 actual shipments, we could see in increase closer to 40% for 2015 vs. 2014. Samsung alone could potentially post an impressive 50%+ increase last year to lead all suppliers. Unfortunately, NAND prices have tracked a super aggressive take down curve,...
SSD Pricing – Stop the Madness!
2015 has ended, which means 2016 has started. Happy New Year everyone! One thing we learned in 2015 is that we have not learned from history. Remember the late 1990s to the early 2000s when 2.5” HDD pricing for notebooks pretty much took a nose dive? It was great for...
The price war for your notebook storage: 128 GB SSD vs. 500 GB HDD
We are reading more and more about how SSD pricing continues to drop and subsequent attach rates for notebook PCs continue to rise. It has been a wild ride to see how aggressive some pricing has been over the past year, favoring the rise of SSD attach rates with each...