Petabyte hard drives

[robbyd86]

20TB seems great!  I've been using 1TB for the last few years and have to constantly delete things to make room.  I'm sure 10yrs from now a Petabyte will be necessary.  Although I think file sizes (at least with movies and tv shows) are getting more compact these days.  Most movies can be found in the 800mb range whereas they used to be 4GB.  High resolution is still in the 4GB range, but that will eventually get trimmed down I'm sure.

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[TECSHARE]

The problem with larger capacity drives is they fail more often. I would personally recommend a hard drive for your OS, at 500gb, then one more for data storage of any size for regularly used files. For your massive archive, burning to blueray discs would be MUCH cheaper than buying a petabyte worth of hard drive storage.

[ALToids]

The problem with larger capacity drives is they fail more often. I would personally recommend a hard drive for your OS, at 500gb, then one more for data storage of any size for regularly used files. For your massive archive, burning to blueray discs would be MUCH cheaper than buying a petabyte worth of hard drive storage.

They only fail more often if they have more platters/heads (assuming same spindle speed).

A 5 platter 1TB drive is less reliable than a 2 platter 1.5TB drive.

[jbreher]

The problem with larger capacity drives is they fail more often.

I don't know where you are getting your data, but the HALT results that I have seen disagree with your general assertion.

[cp1]

I'm certain that you'll have more failures per month with 24 1TB drives than with 6 4TB drives

[ALToids]

I'm certain that you'll have more failures per month with 24 1TB drives than with 6 4TB drives

While that may be true, the net data loss after 10 years will be the same - most likely 12-24TB of data lost.

It's just easier to manage the larger drives and they have higher transfer rates.

If you have access to RAID redundancy then it is just easier to go with larger drives.

[dropt]

If you have access to RAID redundancy then it is just easier to go with larger drives.

+1

QNAP 4-bay populated with 4TB drives in RAID5 here.  If you're storing that much data, do it right FFS.

[ALToids]

If you have access to RAID redundancy then it is just easier to go with larger drives.

+1

QNAP 4-bay populated with 4TB drives in RAID5 here.  If you're storing that much data, do it right FFS.

I picked up a bunch of 3TB external WD at Staples a couple weeks ago.  I was going to crack them open and put them into a NAS that offers some basic RAID (for redundancy, not speed).  I heard the Drobo 5 bays are easy to use and cost about $400.  Should I go with Drobo, Synology, or Qnap as noted above?  I'll mostly be putting family pics and movies (about 500GB so far) and HD movie rips (have about 5TB of this).  I plan on using Win 7 x64 as the OS.  Any suggestions?

[BurtW]

hard drive storage has plateaued for a few years now.. we haven't seen much development.

I can assure you that the march toward higher areal densities continues unabated.

ETA: How long have 6TB HDDs been shipping again?

I tend to disagree with "unabated".  For rotating rust we are seeing dimishing returns.  In the "good old days" we used to double the capacity every 6-9 months.  Look how long it is taking us to implement new technology to double the capacity today.  Also, it is getting much harder to increase density.  It is not just a matter of throwing in new heads and media, increasing TPI and/or BPI, or even just a new head technolgy.

The firmware is also getting exponentially more complex so, yes densities will still go up but at a slower rate than before.

[jbreher]

hard drive storage has plateaued for a few years now.. we haven't seen much development.

I can assure you that the march toward higher areal densities continues unabated.

ETA: How long have 6TB HDDs been shipping again?

I tend to disagree with "unabated".  For rotating rust we are seeing dimishing returns.  In the "good old days" we used to double the capacity every 6-9 months.  Look how long it is taking us to implement new technology to double the capacity today.  Also, it is getting much harder to increase density.  It is not just a matter of throwing in new heads and media, increasing TPI and/or BPI, or even just a new head technolgy.

The firmware is also getting exponentially more complex so, yes densities will still go up but at a slower rate than before.

Don't disagree with the notion that the rate of areal density growth is decreasing. However, can I get an 'amen' to the notion that HDD capacities have not been plateaued for a few years now?

[BurtW]

hard drive storage has plateaued for a few years now.. we haven't seen much development.

I can assure you that the march toward higher areal densities continues unabated.

ETA: How long have 6TB HDDs been shipping again?

I tend to disagree with "unabated".  For rotating rust we are seeing dimishing returns.  In the "good old days" we used to double the capacity every 6-9 months.  Look how long it is taking us to implement new technology to double the capacity today.  Also, it is getting much harder to increase density.  It is not just a matter of throwing in new heads and media, increasing TPI and/or BPI, or even just a new head technolgy.

The firmware is also getting exponentially more complex so, yes densities will still go up but at a slower rate than before.

Don't disagree with the notion that the rate of areal density growth is decreasing. However, can I get an 'amen' to the notion that HDD capacities have not been plateaued for a few years now?

Amen brother bear.

[MelodyRowell]

Petabyte hard drives are a waste, I only used 100G so far..

[Singlebyte]

Petabyte hard drives are a waste

Petabyte hard drives don't even exist...did you even bother to read the thread?

[Lauda]

1 TB is definitely not enough, but 20 TB should be plenty.  Just get about 13 2 TB drives.

You aren't storing anything useful on that I can guarantee it.
What are you storing if I may ask?

[cp1]

1 TB is definitely not enough, but 20 TB should be plenty.  Just get about 13 2 TB drives.

You aren't storing anything useful on that I can guarantee it.
What are you storing if I may ask?

I don't need 20 TB at home, I was giving an alternative to the OP that was actually possible, instead of 1 PB.

[robbyd86]

1 TB is definitely not enough, but 20 TB should be plenty.  Just get about 13 2 TB drives.

You aren't storing anything useful on that I can guarantee it.
What are you storing if I may ask?

I have a ton of tv shows, movies, music, and about 100 GB just of photos I've taken from my various travels.  Every time I want some new tv shows or anything, I have to debate what I'm never going to watch again.  1 TB is a lot, but it's not enough in the scheme of things.

[Bigbrowndingleberry]

I couldn't imagine... the amount of porn. Mind blowing 

[cp1]

1 TB is definitely not enough, but 20 TB should be plenty.  Just get about 13 2 TB drives.

You aren't storing anything useful on that I can guarantee it.
What are you storing if I may ask?

I have a ton of tv shows, movies, music, and about 100 GB just of photos I've taken from my various travels.  Every time I want some new tv shows or anything, I have to debate what I'm never going to watch again.  1 TB is a lot, but it's not enough in the scheme of things.

Yeah I've got 2 TB just in TV shows.  It's like a house, you can always fill up whatever space you have.

[jbreher]

1 TB is definitely not enough, but 20 TB should be plenty.  Just get about 13 2 TB drives.

You aren't storing anything useful on that I can guarantee it.
What are you storing if I may ask?

You absolutely cannnot guarantee that.

I can see you've never engaged in serious media production.

[dropt]

I picked up a bunch of 3TB external WD at Staples a couple weeks ago.  I was going to crack them open and put them into a NAS that offers some basic RAID (for redundancy, not speed).  I heard the Drobo 5 bays are easy to use and cost about $400.  Should I go with Drobo, Synology, or Qnap as noted above?  I'll mostly be putting family pics and movies (about 500GB so far) and HD movie rips (have about 5TB of this).  I plan on using Win 7 x64 as the OS.  Any suggestions?

I'm not too familiar with Drobo units, but it looks like it's suitable for home use.  For the most part, any of those manufacturers you listed will be fine.  The only exception to consider is if you'll have multiple users pulling/pushing data to the box, local connectivity for backups/external disks, and whether you intend to use the device purely as a NAS, or as a NAS/Media portal.

Some things I'd look into before pulling the trigger on the Drobo is its ability to stream those HD videos as from my cursory glance at the 5bay units it seems there are issues.  There also seem to be some concerns about the compatibility of some mSATA drives if you are considering upgrading.  And as a last point, it appears the Drobo really lacks in terms of add-on applications.  This may or may not be a selling point for you, but the Synology and QNAP devices act more like mini-servers than pure NAS'.  To this end, the QNAP and Synology offer things like personal cloud, time machine backups, torrent boxes, etc.