News 128TB SSDs

[Cryogenator]

Samsung announced the first prototype 128TB SSD in 2022, and now Phison has quietly announced one of their own. Just eight such drives provide an entire petabyte of storage, which is eight quadrillion bits, four quadrillion nybbles, two quadrillion crumbs, one quadrillion bytes, one trillion kilobytes, one billion megabytes, one million gigabytes, or one thousand terabytes.

That's enough digital storage space for 10,000 100GB triple-layer Ultra HD Blu-rays, 15,000 66GB dual-layer Ultra HD Blu-rays, 20,000 50GB dual-layer Blu-rays, 40,000 25GB single-layer Blu-rays, 118,000 8.5GB dual-layer DVDs, 213,000 4.7GB single-layer DVDs, 1.429 million 700MB CDs, a millennium of MP3 audio at 256kbps, or 20 million filing cabinets filled with 500 billion pages of text... all within a single desktop computer tower or a small backpack.

The largest SSD currently on the market, the 100TB Nimbus ExaDrive, costs $40,000 ($400 per TB or 40¢ per GB).

 

[Santaman]

Rather large, and you'd need an excellent backup strategy... also, I have a 10MB Seagate HDD made in 1981.. it still works, I don't think any SSD ever will make it to that age and still function.

 

[XCV330]

Rather large, and you'd need an excellent backup strategy... also, I have a 10MB Seagate HDD made in 1981.. it still works, I don't think any SSD ever will make it to that age and still function.

They could have a specialized function for hardware devices to physically move large amounts of data from on-prem to cloud. I know Azure and AWS both have some devices they market like that.

 

[Santaman]

^^ They actually used to do that in the old age of the modem.. pack an external HDD and send someone to the location who's needing the data, worked MUCH faster than sending it over via the ruddy 2400 baud modem..

 

[XCV330]

Sneakernet has the best routing protocols.

 

[Gepard]

^^ They actually used to do that in the old age of the modem.. pack an external HDD and send someone to the location who's needing the data, worked MUCH faster than sending it over via the ruddy 2400 baud modem..

Heck, my first job in my current industry circa 2010 was running hard drives around town for data deliveries. Wasn't that long ago!

 

[Oddish]

I started out in the Age of Kilobytes... now, we're into the Age of Petabytes.

 

[Cryogenator]

I started out in the Age of Kilobytes... now, we're into the Age of Petabytes.

I hope to see the Age of Quettabytes.

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

I hope to see the Age of Quettabytes.

I hope you are strong enough. Here's why:

One quettabyte = 10^30 bytes.
One kilogram mole is 6.02214076×10^26 atoms, so that's about 1,600 times 8 bits per byte times M kilograms of atoms of atomic mass M if you can store only one bit per atom.
For carbon atoms (M=12.011), the mass of the storage, discounting the mechanisms to access each bit, would be nearly 160 metric tons.
If you can store more than one bit per atom, the mass will reduce proportionally.

How scientists managed to store information in a single atom
Storing Two Bits of Data in a Single Atom (scitechdaily.com)

The limit on the amount of information that can be stored in a region of spacetime is called the Bekenstein Bound:
Bekenstein bound - Wikipedia
However, we are a long way from storing bits at the Planck length scale. If we could, we'd be able to create black holes.

 

[Oddish]

However, we are a long way from storing bits at the Planck length scale. If we could, we'd be able to create black holes.

Not sure I'd trust the human race with that ability. Nukes are scary enough.

 

[Cryogenator]

The limit on the amount of information that can be stored in a region of spacetime is called the Bekenstein Bound:
Bekenstein bound - Wikipedia

I cite the Bekenstein bound when people say aging is irreducibly complex and so can never be cured. This is false because the human body contains a finite amount of atoms which can behave in a finite amount of ways, and the number of atoms and level of complexity is far below the physical limits of computation and manipulation, which means complete understanding of and regulation of all cellular functions is certainly physically possible.

However, we are a long way from storing bits at the Planck length scale. If we could, we'd be able to create black holes.

Indeed. That's the final level of the Barrow scale:

I - Manipulation of macroscopic structures, as available to an unaided member of the civilisation.

II - Manipulation of genes and macromolecules.

III - Manipulation of molecules and molecular bonds.

IV - Access to nanotechnology and atomically precise manufacturing; manipulation of individual atoms.

V - Access to picotechnology and femtotechnology; manipulation of individual nuclei.

VI - Access to attotechnology and finer; manipulation of elementary particles.

Ω - Omega-minus engineering; manipulation of the basic structure of space and time.

 

[publiusr]

I miss Bolonkin...he wrote about possible femtomatter.

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

The largest SSD currently on the market, the 100TB Nimbus ExaDrive, costs $40,000 ($400 per TB or 40¢ per GB).

While that's all well & good, the best bang for your buck in HDD world is a 20 TB HDD @ $320 which ~$16/TB.

You need to ask yourself, is that extra speed at $400/TB worth it compared to the much cheaper & more practical $16/TB?

I hope to see the Age of Quettabytes.

Spoiler: I hope to live to see the age of LiB(LuBiBytes)

 

[Oddish]

That's $16,000 for a petabyte. Which is enough data for over two years worth of 4k movies. Better get bingeing...

 

[Cryogenator]

While that's all well & good, the best bang for your buck in HDD world is a 20 TB HDD @ $320 which ~$16/TB.

Recertified drives from ServerPartDeals are even cheaper. You could assemble a petabyte for four figures from them.

I hope to live to see the age of LiB(LuBiBytes)

Enter cryostasis and you might...

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

Recertified drives from ServerPartDeals are even cheaper. You could assemble a petabyte for four figures from them

The HDD Reliability of "Recertified Drives" is also "Questionable".

 

[Oddish]

I might make the zettabyte era. Seems like every 4-5y, we add another power of 10.

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

A lubibyte is about 1.3 x 10^64 bits. That's roughly one bit for every proton in ten million stars of solar mass.

 

[Oddish]

A lubibyte is about 1.3 x 10^64 bits. That's roughly one bit for every proton in ten million stars of solar mass.

So not even molecular circuitry could provide that level of storage... unless your smartphone is the size of Antares.

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

You'd need a supermassive black hole with a Schwarzschild radius of 0.435mm to make it most compact. That would have a mass about 1/20th of the Earth's mass. The gravitational acceleration at the event horizon would be 10^19 g.