14 DAY TRIAL // Seagate announced today the launch of a new series of enterprise and family hard disk drives of 8TB capacity. Called Enterprise Capacity 3.5 HDD, Seagate Enterprise NAS HDD and Seagate Kinetic HDD, the three new models offer storage solutions for all clients who want disk storage size to be increased to the next level.
The biggest HDD in the world at the moment is WD's Ha10, which is, as its name implies, a 10TB server-dedicated monster packed with SMR (Shingled Magnetic Recording) technology, while being Helium filled in order to reduce any air resistance when platters are spinning. Although it's very likely the new 8TB HDDs from Seagate probably don't enjoy the same technology, they do come in some quite accessible, and large, storage sizes.
First of the batch is the Enterprise Capacity 3.5 HDD which comes, as the name implies, in 3.5" form factor and 8TB of capacity. Although Seagate did not disclose specific read/write speeds, they do claim that it delivers a 100 percent increase in random read/write performance compared to previous generations so we'll have to take their their word for it. Seagate also believes that the new Enterprise Capacity 3.5 HDD would fit well in the server racks of many of its clients the like of Supermicro.
Seagate offers server owner a wider range of HDD offers
The second of the new batch is Enterprise NAS HDD which sells as designed for "small- and medium-sized businesses." It provides higher density than the previous classic 3.5 HDD, promising the same capacity in fewer drives in a server rack, while keeping any energy requirement to the minimum.
The last and most advanced HDD from Seagate is the Kinetic HDD, built for data banks, cloud storage and cloud computing. The new drive emphasizes scaled-out storage and rapid deployment in data centers. The Kinetic HDD shares the same SMR technology with its more advanced Ha10 brother, and combined with the Kinetic Open Storage platform, this storage solution can change the TCO (Total Cost of Ownership) equation, by reducing it even further.
The Kinetic HDD also enjoys an open source object storage protocol with Ethernet connectivity that allows data to be exchanged freely among HDD racks bypassing server protocols and multiple layers of legacy hardware and software infrastructure.
Seagate didn't announce any pricing or availability for its new enterprise HDDs.