Ultrastar Hard Drive Uses Helium to Maximize Capacity
Western Digital's HGST is using helium to tackle industry-wide challenges in scaling current areal density technologies.
This week Western Digital-owned HGST announced that its new 6 TB Ultrastar He6 hard disk drive is now shipping. This isn't just any hard drive, though. The Ultrastar He6 uses HGST's HelioSeal, which means the spinning platters are sealed inside a hermetic chamber filled with helium instead of air.
The density of helium is one-seventh that of air. The use of helium in HGST's
new drive equates to dramatically less drag force acting on the spinning disk stack and a substantial reduction in mechanical power from the motor. The lower helium density also means that the fluid flow forces buffeting the disks and the arms, which position the heads over the data tracks, are greatly reduced. This allows for disks to be placed closer together (seven disks in the same enclosure) and to place data tracks closer together (allowing continued scaling in data density). The lower shear forces and more efficient thermal conduction of helium also mean the drive will run cooler and will emit less acoustic noise.
"With ever-increasing pressures on corporate and cloud data centers to improve storage efficiencies and reduce costs, HGST is at the forefront delivering a revolutionary new solution that significantly improves data center TCO on virtually every level – capacity, power, cooling and storage density – all in the same 3.5-inch form factor," said Brendan Collins, vice president of product marketing, HGST.
The Ultrastar He6 boasts 5.3 idle watts and weighs in at 640 g (HGST claims that the Ultrastar He6 packs a 38 percent lower weight-per-TB compared to a 3.5-inch, five-platter, air-filled 4 TB drive). It's designed for cloud storage, massive scale-out environments, disk-to-disk backup, and replicated or RAID environments.
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Jane McEntegart is a writer, editor, and marketing communications professional with 17 years of experience in the technology industry. She has written about a wide range of technology topics, including smartphones, tablets, and game consoles. Her articles have been published in Tom's Guide, Tom's Hardware, MobileSyrup, and Edge Up.
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jimmysmitty I would like to see this using Seagates 1TB platter tech. 7TB HDDs would be pretty neat.Reply -
GeeLouie The world is running out of helium and these bozos are using it in hard drives? patheticReply -
jimmysmitty GeeLouie, NightLight this is a warning to cut it out. Anything further will come with more than a warning.Reply
11872450 said:Wonder how would also this hardrive perform reliably?
Reliability wise it might last longer if it runs cooler. Heat is one of the biggest killers when it comes to mechanical (and electrical) devices as it causes the parts to expand, and when they cool they contract.
We will have to wait and see but WD also has a HDD based on the technology so I wouldn't doubt seeing others also adopt it as it seems promising. -
GeeLouie a warning for what? We cannot discuss? Show me what is against the guidelines because my posts were very mild.Reply -
usertests These hard drives use very little helium compared to other industries that use it. Your alarmism is not informed. Even if there is a helium crisis and the price went up 100x I expect the premium from the helium itself to be very small. And if the seals work like they're supposed to, maybe WD could reclaim helium from dead drives (they won't need to).Reply