HAMR and 30TB are just to keep BoD happen as hype. When the bubble burst, it will hurt the employees more. Sad.
19 replies (most recent on top)
I think it was Quantum that came out with a 5 1/4" drive called Big Foot, long after that form factor disappeared. The market never developed and Quantum took a bath. Growing the form factor always sounds compelling but the customer is in the driver's seat when it comes to form factor and power draw.
Add 10 TB of flash and hide it inside the drive fake it until you make it
You can't just create a whole new form factor without a major customer signing on. That is a recipe for disaster.
Its pathetic that we won't commit 'in addition' to traditional and way safer solutions to grow capacity like 1.5" and 2" high drives. 14-16D and 20-22D in one drive. 30TB, 40TB? Totally doable w/o HAMR. Not crazy, just shelved for far too long in advanced dep... Not crown jewels sh-t crazy. Yet here we are. Shouldn't be to just choose 1" between SMR or CMR/HAMR. Stop worrying about slot size of hyper scalers. As if they would give a cr-p. Self inflicted like so many other things.
The only reason to keep HAMR reliability rates as a closely guarded secret is that they're poor. If they were good, marketing would be screaming it from the rooftops, customers would accept it, and we'd be shipping substantial amounts of HAMR drives by this point. Come on, its' been well over ten years, and it isn't ready. If we have to wait for 2030 for it to work, SSD would take over the majority of the market, and Seagate wouldn't have the money to get it out there. Stick a fork in it...
HAMR is still far far away from production and be cost effective. Maybe 2030 will be ready. Hype for now.
Reason to layoff all at FRE working on HAMR, hahaha whoever thinks this will work must be on something good that was being fed to u
The current HAMR reli-rates are a very closely held secret for many reasons. Even those who are required to sign internal NDA’s involving HAMR ever see the total picture. So while we all agree it has been insanely slow and expensive it’s highly unlikely we would still be starting wafers if it was hopeless. Many of us work on HAMR everyday with no visibility concerning yield numbers. If the yield numbers suck or are great we have no way of knowing. Just my 2 cents.
Due what's the point of hamr when you are bringing in 40tb+ hard drives . Still you want to do the tape equivalent. Will the head even last writing the full player :;
HAMR reliability is largely a material science problem. An NFT made of gold required for optic properties with a melting point of 1,000C, in a device that thermally cycles up to 500C. Repeated laser heating cycles softens and deforms the NFT peg until it no longer works. Nothing's every going to change for reliability until the material science issue is solved. I know other materials are being investigated but no real alternatives have emerged to date. You can put all the fancy error proofing firmware you want on to try to fake reliability but it's not going really fix the fundamental problem. So has Seagate fixed the material science issue yet? If not, it's not going to work. It's that simple.
This is what happens when you cut basic research. STX did it w/ Pittsburgh, and WD did it w/ YB. Now the industry is basically hoping professors that don't have enough information can figure it out. Hint- they haven't and they won't.
It is sad, it could work.
its the golden snitch that wins the game
If HAMR reliability can't be resolved after a decade and billions of dollars invested, then wake up and embrace the obvious.
The time, money and effort the teams have invested in our crown Jewels is nuts.
However - when, at the end of 2022 we still run & plan HAMR DOEs trying to understand the fundamentals of DVL and reli issues - time is really really running out. MSL has no clue what they are doing w/ their multi million dollar equipment toys. “Peak here, peak there, no idea what it means”…it’s run by interns, frankly…
At this point in time the issues/challenges should be super clear what it takes to make it work in effing mass pro.
Mechanical teams are asked to to make regular 11 and 12+D work which all seems way more realistic than anything HAMR.
But -!here we are.
I thought HAMR means Have Another Margarita Round!
HAMR works, but it's reliability simply won't meet customer expectations. Add the extra expense due to the complexity of the manufacturing process, and SSD starts looking good as a replacement.
HAMR is the only hope for this company continuing like it or not. Start praying hard.
Stop being such a jerk! There are many people who have worked hard to make HAMR viable and it's light-years (pun) improved from where it started. Perp recording and GMR were also slow to develop and both wound up very successful. These are the same people who are trying to ignore the current environment to keep working HAMR issues and you are being a d--k toward them.
When the HAMR drops, the hammer will drop.