Thursday, April 4, 2013

"Hitachi Fills Its Drives with Helium," Maximum PC's Holiday 2012 edition.

We all know that Helium is less dense than air, but only Hitachi finds a way to make that useful when it comes to computer hardrives. Hitachi spent the last six years researching how to apply this in the fine art of Hard drive crafting. The reason they use Helium is actually pretty simple. a hard drive has spinning platers and if the air inside creates drag on the platers and heads over them. So if there is less resistance they can move faster and need less energy to do so. This is very energy effect and great for computers. these drives will be available to buy in 2013, this will be another small improvement in the quickly changing world of computer technology.

In my opinion this article is very well written and interesting. Advancements in Hard Drive technology is very important in the consumer computer market, but they it matters more for big companies like Google which have giant server farms with tens of thousands of Hard Drives. So having drives be for example 40% more energy efficient can save a lot of money per year. Now even though it will be huge for server owners. I dont really think Helium filled drives will be big news for consumers. So i dont agree completely with the article, Maybe because im slightly biast towards Solid State Drives for their speed and performance. I do think the article is certainly worth the read if you are interested into computer Hard Ware.

Reviewed by SSN, grade 9.
Montrose Library

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