A hybrid hard drive combines the performance of a solid-state drive with the capacity of a mechanical drive. They're bigger than SSDs and faster than ever hard drive.
It is sometimes referred to as a solid-state hybrid drive (SSHD). The drive automatically caches data into solid-state storage for faster file access.
Solid state drives are much faster than mechanical drives. Prices have dropped noticeably, so it makes sense to upgrade to an SSD. But even cheaper drives are less capacious. 1 GB of solid state drive costs $0.58, and 1 GB of mechanical drive costs $0.06. An affordable solid-state drive has a maximum capacity of 256 GB, while a mechanical drive has a capacity of 2 or 3 TB. Mechanical drives are slow, but have enormous capacity at an extremely low cost per gigabyte.
To take advantage of both types of drives, many people equip their computers with both solid-state and mechanical drives. The solid state drive is used for system files and programs that need speed. A large mechanical disk is used for long-term storage of files that are not particularly needed. fast access, - for example, collections of films. This requires installing both drives into the computer and choosing which programs and files to put on each drive. You have to move files to another drive yourself. Moving a program to another disk means deleting it and reinstalling it in another location.
The hybrid drive contains magnetic disk and a solid-state drive with the capacity of a small solid-state drive. This disk appears to the operating system as a single disk. You are not responsible for which files go to the mechanical drive and which to the solid state. The drive's firmware determines what makes it onto the solid-state drive and what doesn't.
The SSD part of the disk serves as a “cache” - files that are accessed frequently - files operating system and programs, the firmware is stored in an SSD drive. The cache is stored in non-volatile semiconductor solid-state memory, surviving reboots and thereby speeding up the boot procedure.
Access to system and program files is performed at the speed of a solid-state disk, while simultaneously providing the capacity of the magnetic disk for other files. The drive handles this on its own—you don't have to move files back and forth or decide what goes where.
Most hybrid drives have a small SSD storage capacity. Some of them have 1 TB of mechanical capacity and only 8 GB of semiconductor memory. 8 GB is enough to store system and program files, but this volume is not comparable to 128 or 256 GB, which can accommodate all system and program files.
Apple's Fusion Drive is also a hybrid and is equipped with a magnetic capacity of 1 to 3 TB along with 128 GB of solid-state memory.
Hybrid wheels Cheaper than solid-state ones because they contain less solid-state memory. A 2TB hybrid drive with 8GB of cache is more expensive than a regular 2TB mechanical drive, but cheaper than a 256GB SSD, which has even less free space.
A major advantage is that the hybrid drive is a single physical drive. If your laptop only has room for one drive, but you need the speed of a solid-state drive and the capacity of a mechanical drive, then a hybrid drive is the best solution.
It's all about price and capacity. If magnetic and solid state drives were the same in cost, then hybrid drives would not be needed at all. Solid state drives would be better in every way.
Hybrid drive is slow when first used. When it first starts working, caching has not yet been done, which means that the disk will be just as slow as a classic magnetic one. As you use it, the drive will learn which files to cache and speed will gradually increase.
It's up to you to choose which drive to use, but our team prefers a hybrid drive with at least 32GB of solid-state memory.
January 19, 2014 at 5:07 pm
Hybrid drives SSHD - what kind of bird?
- King Servers Blog
In our work we often have to deal with a variety of information storage devices, including hard drives and solid state drives information. At the same time, sometimes you come across quite unusual devices that are not common everywhere. For example, SSHD - hybrid hard drives. There are probably people on Habré who are well acquainted with this type of information storage device, but there are also those who have not even heard of such “hybrids”.
So, hybrid hard drives, first of all, are a compromise solution that allows you to both increase the overall performance of the system in which they are installed and reduce the price of such a system.
After all, despite their widespread use, solid-state drives are still quite expensive, and it is unlikely that there will come a time soon when the price of such drives will drop significantly.
Regular hard disks- inexpensive, for the most part, but their productivity is limited, you cannot “jump” above a certain limit. That's why hybrid hard drives appeared. SSHD appeared a few years ago, and at first they were pure exoticism, which few people took seriously (and few knew about them). The main advantage of a hybrid hard drive is that it increases the overall performance of the system in which they are installed, using only one drive bay (rather than two, if you use both an SSD and a regular hard drive). Now there are “hybrid” models small sizes, for example, with a thickness of only 7 mm (this is exactly what the ST500LM000 model from Seagate is), which allows you to install such drives in netbooks/ultrabooks.
The operating principle of SSHD is based on caching the most frequently used data using flash memory, that is, the SSD part of the “hybrid”. Already when the operating system is launched for the first time on a laptop/PC with a “hybrid”, the files that the operating system needs to load are placed in the non-volatile part of the SSHD memory. As a result, the OS startup speed increases, and quite significantly.
The hybrid drive, by the way, shows almost similar file transfer speed results compared to conventional hard drives. But the difference is in the work different types devices becomes very noticeable when comparing file access time (Access Time). For example, if you take a Seagate ST500LT032 drive with a capacity of 500 GB and compare it with the “hybrid” ST500LM000 of the same capacity, then the file access speed will be 24.2 and 0.3 ms.
As for the maximum speed of the interface, the difference is no longer several times, but 15%. In the first case, 101 MB/s, in the second - 115 MB/s.
There are also disadvantages, and first of all, it is the inability to fit all critical data on the SSD part of an SSHD disk. Typically, an SSD in a “hybrid” is installed with a capacity of 8 GB, sometimes more (for example, models with 32 GB of flash memory are not uncommon), but then such a drive will be more expensive.
The price of “hybrids” is only slightly higher than the price of regular ones. hard drives. If we take the models already mentioned above, then the price of the Seagate Laptop Thin SSHD ST500LM000 is $73-75, and the Seagate ST500LT032 is about $50.
So, if you want to increase the OS loading speed, as well as the overall performance of your laptop/desktop PC, we recommend using “hybrids”. Well, that's if saving money is important to you. If not, then you should use SSD and regular hard drives separately.
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V online store Flash ComputersAn article about the advantages and disadvantages of hybrid hard drives that combine strengths HDD and SSD drives
Over the past ten years or so, solid state drives (SSDs) have gained popularity in the IT world. First, they got into laptops and mobile devices with their small form factor and no moving parts. Now they are making their way into enterprise storage systems. Using the same flash memory found in USB drives, mobile phones and SD cards, they offer a long list of advantages over their electromechanical counterparts, solid-state hard drives. SSD drives computers have no moving parts, they are more resistant to shock and other forms of physical damage, and they are lightning fast in their speed of reading and writing data.
HDD storage capacity has grown quite consistently - nowadays, massive 3TB and 4TB drives are within reach, and even 8TB and 10TB giants have made their way to the market. Hard drives reach speeds of up to 15,000 rpm. They are noisier, hotter, and require more power than their flash counterparts.
So why can't we ditch our hard drives and solid state drives? The answer is simple: the cost of one gigabyte of an SSD drive is noticeably more expensive. As of January 2015, a 1 TB hard drive can cost around $50, while the equivalent cost for an SSD is around $380 - $400.
In 2010, a number of manufacturers, starting with Seagate and Samsung, began introducing a third option in the drive world in an attempt to bridge the price and performance gap between HDDs and SSDs by offering a hybrid option. Since then Western Digital and Toshiba also started making hybrid drives. The hybrid drive provides some best features both technologies, combining the speed of an SSD with the cost-effectiveness of an electromechanical HDD.
How does a computer's hybrid hard drive work?
The basis of a hybrid hard drive is the combination of a cache with rotating electromagnetic plates of a solid-state HDD. A solid-state hybrid drive (SSHD) typically consists of 8, 16 or 32 GB of flash capacity and a larger HDD for storing some of the data. The idea is that "hot data" should be accessible quickly or frequently (eg by the operating system). This data can be cached on the SSD and as a result is retrieved faster than if it were stored on the platters themselves. It's the same principle as installing hard disk and SSD on a desktop machine, that is, dual disk and hybrid solution, except that performance optimizations are built into the firmware and adapt to storage needs. These adaptive or self-learning optimization techniques eliminate the need to manually move files/applications to the appropriate hard drives.
There are currently two modes of operation for all hybrid hard drives, or SSHDs. First, the optimized mode itself, or stand-alone mode, which determines the “hot” and “cold” data to be written to the disk. For the host machine, the drive is not traditional internal device storage
Another SSHD mode is host optimized mode, or anchor host mode. In this format, the machine owner designates which data is hot and cold using its operating system, device drivers, and in some cases, through software. The host machine regularly sends designations to disk via SATA interface and instructs the drive how to store the data.
Benefits of hybrid disk storage
The key benefit of using a hybrid storage device is increased performance with high storage headroom, without a significant increase in cost (around $100 for 1TB SSHD), while maintaining high potential. SSHDs have the capacity of a computer's hard drive with increased lookup speeds for cached data on an HDD solid-state hard drive—at a fraction of the cost of an SSD.
In addition, a hybrid hard drive provides the computer with faster access to critical data, and there are other benefits associated with flash memory, which is also used on SSHDs. For example, if calibration is done correctly, you can reduce stress and wear on the drive, resulting in a longer lifespan than traditional solid-state hard drives.
Disadvantages of Hybrid Hard Drives
Although, hybrid drives - perfect solution, they are not perfect. Retrieving data from your hard drive is as fast as traditional solid state HDDs. Hybrid drives are still vulnerable to physical damage, and you won't benefit from the silence of an SSD.
Since we are experts in the field of data recovery, we must discuss the implications of data recovery under hybrid storage. The good news is that the solid-state portion of an SSHD is used primarily as a cache or for storing operating system files, and you are unlikely to lose data on that portion of the drive. If you happen to lose data from the solid-state area of a hybrid drive, recovery presents its own challenges, such as alternative methods of organizing the data.
Overall, hybrid drives have a lot to offer both consumers and business users looking to SSD speeds, while at the same time looking for cost per gigabyte of hard drive. This is a great way to bridge the gap between a solid state HDD and a fast SSD.
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