Skip to main content

This microwave-based hard drive will offer 40 terabytes of storage

A laptop mechanical hard drive.
Western Digital
In terms of hard drives, solid-state drives are popular, including with us, because they offer speed and reliability within a smaller package than other hard drives. Those advantages do come with a trade-off when compared to older disc-based drives, namely a lack of storage capacity. SSDs simply can’t store as much information as disc-based drives. Western Digital is one of the companies that has led the way in terms of disc-based drives. BGR reports that the manufacturer recently unveiled a new technology that could help disc-based drives maintain their dominance for years to come.

WD is currently working on the production of microwave-assisted magnetic recording, or MAMR. This new technology promises to be ideal for data centers and other ventures where storage capacity, rather than speed, are the most important factors. By 2025, the company expects to have an MAMR that can store up to 40TB of data. According to Western Digital’s blog, the company believes that MAMR represents the future of data center storage.

“The company recently innovated a breakthrough in material and process that provides the required reliable and predictable performance, as well as the manufacturability to accelerate areal density and cost improvements to an estimated average of 15 percent per year,” the blog reads. “Developments in the other energy-assisted technology, specifically, heat-assisted magnetic recording (HAMR), present new material science and reliability challenges that are not a factor in MAMR. Only MAMR demonstrates the reliability and cost profile that meets the demands of data center operators.”

The technology is certainly impressive and, if it works as promised, it will prove popular with data-heavy businesses. That being said, we imagine many consumers will prefer the faster options available from SSDs. Consumer hard drives are fairly affordable right now, so we believe that most people, especially gamers, would rather have a couple of fast hard drives than one large, slow hard drive.

Seagate, another major data storage technology manufacturer, unveiled the Seagate Game Drive for Xbox SSD last year. The device is an external solid-state storage solution built specifically for Microsoft’s Xbox One console. Seagate also offers a portable SSD built for PlayStation 4 and PS3 consoles.

Eric Brackett
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Micron’s new tiny 2TB SSD is bad news for laptop HDDs
An HDD and an SSD lie on a table.

Micron has announced the 2400 SSD, the world’s first 176-layer PCIe Gen4 QLC SSD and the first 2TB 22x30mm SSD.

Micron Technology confirmed it has begun volume shipments of the world's first 176-layer QLC NAND SSD, which utilizes the most advanced NAND architecture. The Micron 2400 SSD will become one of the first products that makes use of the new technology.

Read more
The best M.2 solid-state drives
M.2 SSD in a laptop.

If you’re interested in upgraded performance and faster storage, it may be time to switch to a compact M.2 SSD. These speedy, stick-shaped solid-state drives are made for optimal data transfer, especially with NVMe and PCI Express Gen 4.0 support, and they’re sized to be compatible with many laptops and smaller desktops. If you have a motherboard that supports M.2 drives, it’s certainly worth taking a look, especially if you want the best gaming performance and load times. We’ve examined all the options -- here are our top picks.

Note: M.2 SSDs do come in a variety of lengths. Always check that you have room for a specific model before you buy. Upgrading your motherboard may be a good idea as well, especially if it doesn’t support PCI Express 4.0.
Best M.2 SSDs

Read more
The largest flash drives currently available

If you need to back up valuable files or make sure you never lose priceless memories, a convenient solution is to use a flash drive. Unfortunately, if you plan to store hundreds of gigabytes or more, you probably can’t pick a flash drive up at any convenience store.

We’ve gone through and run comparison tests on some of the most extensive flash drives on the market, and our team has compiled the results.

Read more