SSHD hybrid drives - what kind of bird?
- King Servers Blog
In our work, we often have to deal with a variety of storage media, including hard drives and solid-state storage drives. At the same time, sometimes quite unusual devices that are not common everywhere come across. For example, SSHD - hybrid hard drives. Probably, there are people on Habré who are well acquainted with this type of information storage, but there are also those who have not even heard of such “hybrids”.
So, hybrid hard drives are, first of all, a compromise solution that allows both to increase the overall performance of the system in which they are installed, and to reduce the price of such a system.
Indeed, despite the widespread use, solid-state drives are still quite expensive, and it is unlikely that the moment will come when the price of such drives will drop significantly in the near future.
Ordinary hard drives are inexpensive, for the most part, but their performance is limited, you cannot “jump” above a certain limit. Therefore, hybrid hard drives appeared. SSHD appeared a few years ago, and at first they were pure exotic, which few people took seriously (and few people knew about them). The main advantage of a hybrid hard drive is to increase the overall performance of the system in which they are installed using only one drive bay (instead of two if you use both an SSD and a regular hard drive). Now there are "hybrid" models of small sizes, for example, with a thickness of only 7 mm (this is the ST500LM000 model from Seagate), which allows you to install such drives in netbooks / ultrabooks.
The principle of operation of SSHD is based on caching the most frequently used data using flash memory, that is, the SSD part of the “hybrid”. Already at the first start of the operating system on a laptop / PC with a “hybrid”, the files that the operating system needs to load are placed in the non-volatile part of the SSHD memory. As a result, the startup speed of the OS increases, and quite significantly.
The hybrid drive, by the way, shows almost the same file transfer speed results compared to conventional hard drives. But the difference in the operation of different types of devices becomes very noticeable if we compare the access time to files (Access Time). For example, if you take a 500 GB Seagate ST500LT032 drive and compare it with a ST500LM000 "hybrid" of the same capacity, then the file access speed will be 24.2 and 0.3 ms.
As for the speed limit of the interface, the difference is not several times, but 15%. In the first case, 101 MB / s, in the second - 115 MB / s.
There are also disadvantages, and first of all, this is the inability to fit all critical data on the SSD part of the SSHD drive. Usually, an SSD in a “hybrid” is installed with a capacity of 8 GB, sometimes more (for example, models with 32 GB of flash memory are not uncommon), but then such a drive will be more expensive.
At the price of "hybrids" only slightly higher than the price of conventional hard drives. If we take the models already mentioned above, then the price of the Seagate Laptop Thin SSHD ST500LM000 is $73-75, and the Seagate ST500LT032 is about $50.
So, if you want to increase the speed of loading the OS, as well as the overall performance of your laptop / desktop PC, we recommend using "hybrids". Well, that's in case savings are important to you. If not, then you should use SSD and regular hard drives separately.
). SSDs do not use magnetic disks that rotate (as in HDDs), but fixed flash memory chips, similar to . However, with numerous advantages, solid state has still not been able to completely replace hard drives even in laptops, not to mention. The main disadvantage of SSDs is their high price: a gigabyte of their volume costs much more than an HDD. Therefore, we will tell you in which cases it is better to choose an SSD, HDD or hybrid solution.
Benefits of an SSD
The main advantages of solid state drives over hard drives are:
- high performance;
- physical resistance.
For example, the sequential read and write speed of a 2.5-inch laptop HDD is 100 MB/s, and a 3.5-inch desktop HDD is 150 MB/s. The speed of random read-write (files are scattered over the entire surface of the disk) in the HDD can be ten times lower than sequential.
An SSD is another matter: even when connected to a motherboard with an outdated SATA II interface, the linear data reading speed will be less than 250 MB / s. And it is worth upgrading to SATA III, as the speed will increase to 400-500 MB / s. In turn, the linear write speed of an SSD, depending on the model, can either be equal to the read performance or be half as much (but still higher compared to the HDD). And due to the minimal delays in data access (SSD, unlike HDD, you do not need to move the read head across the surface of the disk), the speed of random read-write is also significantly higher.
With no moving parts (electric motor, read heads), solid state drives are not afraid of exposure to strong vibration and shock. This allows, for example, to work on a laptop while driving a car on a bumpy dirt road. However, it’s not worth it to crash test an SSD so that you don’t have to mourn the information that was stored on it later. They are less afraid of SSDs and overheating: operating temperatures up to 70°C are acceptable, while HDDs are limited to 60°C.
Advantages of HDD
The good old hard drives also have their advantages, namely the possibility of repeated overwriting of data and an advantageous ratio of price and volume. With very active use of SSDs (server PCs), memory blocks can be “wiped to holes”. Depending on the type of flash memory - TLC, MLC or SLC (second mass) - blocks can be overwritten from a thousand to hundreds of thousands of times. Worn out blocks are automatically blocked, causing the SSD to lose volume over time.
Traditional hard drives, on the other hand, allow you to overwrite data much more times - the number goes into the millions. Therefore, it is not so much magnetic disks that fail in the HDD (although bad sectors also sometimes appear on them), but mechanical elements. However, data is not overwritten as often on home and office PCs as it is on servers. Unless the registry of the Windows operating system reads and writes data continuously (it is not surprising that bad sectors on the HDD surface most often appear exactly at the location of the registry).
But when it comes to price, it becomes impossible to argue with the victory of hard drives. At the moment, for $100 you can buy a 120 GB SSD, a 2.5-inch 1 TB HDD, or a 3.5-inch 2 TB HDD. The difference in volume between SSD and HDD for the same price is tenfold, which is why you should pay attention to hybrid solutions.
Benefits of hybrids
A hybrid is called a PC disk subsystem, which combines the advantages of SSD and HDD - high speed and large volume at a reasonable price. There can be three options for a hybrid disk subsystem: an SSD large enough to install the operating system and programs (60-120 GB) plus a large HDD for storing photos, videos, music and games; large HDD plus a separate SSD of small capacity (20-32 GB) for caching frequently used programs; and finally hybrid accumulated (HDD plus a small SSD in a single package).
The first version of the hybrid disk subsystem is, of course, the best, but also the most expensive - it will cost a good $200 (HDD+SSD). Those who want to save money should choose the second option - a small SSD for caching costs only $50. However, for SSD caching to work, a motherboard that supports Intel Smart Response Technology (Intel Z68, H77, Z77, H87, Z87, H97 and Z97 chipsets) is required. Hybrid drives (SSHD) are best suited for laptops, where you have to sacrifice a DVD drive to install separate SSD and HDD.
SSD Form Factors
Not all solid state drives are made in the popular way (an additional mount is required for installation in a 3.5-inch slot). In addition to 2.5-inch, there are 1.8-inch models with a SATA connection. They are used, however, in the so-called embedded systems, such as on-board computers of premium cars. For thin laptops (ultrabooks), extremely compact SSD form factors and. And for computer enthusiasts who are ready to give any money for the most powerful components in the world, solid state boards are offered in the form of PCI-Express 3.0 expansion cards (linear read-write speed reaches an impressive 1000-1500 MB / s).
Migrating to SSD!
Installing a solid state drive speeds up the PC much more than, say, upgrading the processor, even if it has all eight cores. Reducing the boot time of the operating system, falling asleep and waking up the PC, launching programs (even a web browser and a text editor) is hard to miss. And you can transfer Windows from HDD to SSD, along with all installed and configured programs, with just two mouse clicks using the free utility EaseUS Partition Master Free. Or just contact ours for help.
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Hard drive 500Gb - Seagate FireCuda SSHD ST500LX025
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Hard drive 2.5 SATA3 500GB Seagate FireCuda 128Mb (ST500LX025)
Flash memory type - MLC. Purpose - for a laptop. Form factor - 2.5". With a rotation speed of 5400 rpm. With an average access time, reading 6 ms. Type - hybrid. SATA interface - SATA 6Gb/s. With a capacity of 500 GB. With 8192 MB flash memory. With a read speed of 140.0 Mb/s. With a maximum noise level of 22 dB. With an interface bandwidth of 600.0 Mb/s.
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Hard drive 2.5 500.0 Gb Seagate ST500LX025 Firecuda SATAIII (5400rpm 128Mb)
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Hard drive 1Tb - Seagate FireCuda SSHD ST1000LX015
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in online store Flash ComputersTo date, there are a large number of different types of devices for recording, storing and processing information. One of the most sought-after developments that have already become quite dense in our lives is a hybrid SSHD device.
It is a conventional hard drive equipped with a solid-state memory section. The principle of operation of this device is peculiar.
Story
The device of the type in question appeared relatively long ago, almost immediately after various kinds of solid-state drives such as SSD were put into mass production. The latter had extremely high performance and other advantages.. But they also differed in almost exorbitant cost relative to conventional hard drives.
Photo: The world's first transparent SSD
The way out of this situation was a hybrid hard drive. He, unlike his more simply arranged counterparts, is supplied not only with ordinary pancakes rotating on a special spindle, but also with a memory chip.
This kind of engineering solution - to combine two different types of memory into one package - made it possible to reduce the cost of computers and at the same time increase their performance.
In order to understand what SSHD is, you need to familiarize yourself with its device. The most important difference from a conventional hard drive is the presence of memory chips.
Device
The type of data storage and processing device under consideration consists of two main parts:
solid state memory;
hard drives.
Hard drives can be made of aluminum or glass plates coated with some kind of ferrimagnetic material. Solid-state memory is a microcircuit, data is written to it non-mechanically.
The plates rotating on a special spindle are placed in a hermetically sealed chamber filled with nitrogen or other similar gas. It is free of impurities, its moisture content is minimal. There is a double cleaning system in case dust or other foreign particles get into the containment area. Inside the case there is a three-phase synchronous motor, as well as heads for reading and writing data.
Principle of operation
The principle of operation of an SSHD device is very simple. Arrays for recording data are ordinary metal discs with a special coating. Information is recorded on them using the tunneling magnetoresistive effect. As a result of this effect, the magnetic field affects the resistance of the magnetic surface of the disks. Which leads to a change in the magnetization vector of individual elements.
Data is read in the same way. The head hovers over the metal surface and the reverse process occurs - the resistance of the surface of the plates affects the magnetic field of the writing head. The received information is analyzed and decoded.
The working principle of a hybrid drive is completely different from a conventional hard drive. In fact, this microcircuit is a flash memory into which various kinds of data are written. Its speed is much higher than a standard hard drive.
The essence of the hybrid SSHD is that metal plates are used to accommodate permanently stored information. The use of the solid-state part of the device is carried out only after the operating system is launched. It records those files that the system accesses constantly. Thus, access to them is greatly simplified and accelerated.
It is due to this that the speed of work increases. As an interface for connection, an interface called SATA is used.
Performance
If we compare the file transfer speed of a conventional drive and a hybrid drive, then it will be almost the same. In SSHD, it will not be much faster, the increase in speed due to solid-state memory will be a maximum of 15%. But the difference becomes very noticeable if you measure the speed of file access. This parameter is referred to as Access Time in all testing applications.
For comparison, the two most common models can be used:
Data access speed when using ST500LT will be 24.2 m/s. The ST500LM has a similar characteristic of 0.3 m/s. So the performance difference is very big.
You can most clearly see the difference in performance when testing in some specialized work. For example, in PCMark 05.
Where is the best place to use an SSHD drive?
The drives in question are used both in laptops and in ordinary, stationary computers. That is why both a full-length version - 3.5 inches, and a reduced one are produced. There are also a large number of models whose thickness is within 7 mm. Because they are quite often used in laptops.
Most often, drives with solid state additional memory are used in laptops, as these devices suffer from a lack of performance. This is due to the compactness of the hardware. And a solid state drive can compensate for this shortcoming. But it is also often possible to find the disk in question in ordinary desktop PCs.
Short review
Most often on sale you can find a model marked as Seagate Laptop Thin SSHD. It is also easy to find its overview, in appearance it can be confused with the most common disk drive, equipped with two metal plates coated with ferromagnetic coating.
The model in question has overall dimensions of 2.5 inches. The process of data exchange is carried out through an interface labeled SATA 6. The amount of internal memory is 500 GB. The spindle speed is not very high - only 5400 rpm.
Other performance features are also outstanding:
- power consumption - 0.9 W;
- noise level - 2.2 dB;
- impact resistance - 350/1000 g;
- dimensions:
- length - 100.35 mm;
- height - 70.1 mm;
- depth - 7 mm;
- weight - 95 g.
Full transition to hybrid and solid-state storage devices will soon be implemented. Since this direction has a very big potential for development.
Extremely high speed of work allows to carry out a greater number of operations in the shortest period of time. Solid-state read-only memory is a big step into a new future.
