Re: Seagate shifts B40bn project to Malaysia

"Nick" <nicknomail@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
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"Bua Lamphu" <harold_in_his_wheelchair@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in
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"Nick" <nicknomail@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
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<snipped>

This article was only ONE of the many IT-News articles that I receive
or read daily.

That article didn't adress that HDD's will be obsolete in the near future
and SMD's will replace them.
What's the point of quotng a article that doesn't adress this "prophecy".

It is part of the total developments in this sector.

My assumption or "prophecy" if you want, was based on the TOTAL of
these articles.
Searching for all the links of previous IT-News would be a tedious job
and would cost me days or even months.

I'm not asking for all the links but it strikes me as odd that you can't
even find one link that clearly shows this prediction is well-founded by
some CEO.
Google isn't you're friend?

As I stated before, I was going to do a more specific search on this "when I
have time".
But as you ask so nicely. I did a search on this discussion now.
Google is not my friend, but, Google sucks as a search machine.
I have other and more reliable search engines.
I give you the links of the first 3 that I found:

*************************************************
War of the Disks: Hard Disk Drives vs. Flash Solid State Disks

To quote from the Solid State Disks Buyers Guide published by
STORAGEsearch.com
"In fact the SSD is replacing servers and software licenses. SSDs can be
used either to speed up the response time of existing applications as an
alternative to buying more servers, or to reduce the number of servers and
software licenses deployed. The economics can be compellingly in favor of an
SSD deployment".

The industry is also expecting more breakthroughs as higher memory
capacities and faster performance are now being produced for a wider array
of choices fit for any mission-critical application.

Analysts foresee a rapidly closing gap between HDD and flash SSD pricing
(see related article by Marius Tudor, BiTMICRO Networks - "Are Flash
Solid-State Disks Ready for the Enterprise" ).

This vision is also bolstered by a recent announcement (July 2005) of
electronic giant Samsung that they will invest heavily in improving their
flash and DRAM production lines and flash SSD equipped laptops. Only time
will tell if we will witness widespread commercial adoption of SSDs.
....BiTMICRO Networks profile

http://www.storagesearch.com/bitmicro-art3.html

****************************************************

Grass Valley - SanDisk Extreme III CompactFlash cards
Chuang explained that with SanDisk high-performance CompactFlash cards
currently reaching 8 gigabytes 1 in capacity - and with higher capacities
expected in the near future - flash memory cards ?now have enough capacity
to make them a viable alternative to the use of hard disk drives in
professional camcorders.? High-performance SanDisk Extreme III CompactFlash
cards also can provide the faster throughput required by professional-grade
camcorders. SanDisk Extreme III CompactFlash cards, among the fastest in the
industry, have minimum write and read speeds of 20 megabytes per second (160
megabits per second).

http://www.letsgodigital.org/en/news/articles/story_7444.html

**************************************************

Curtiss-Wright Introduces 64 GB XMC/PMC Solid State Flash Disk Card

"The PBOD is ideal for applications in harsh environments where extreme
temperature, shock or vibration make the use of mechanical hard disk drives
impractical."

And SCT would not be the appropriate place to post them, even OT.

That's some strange reasoning coming from someone who made quite some OT
posts in this NG in the past.

Even more strange is the fact that someone as you make that remark, but
didn't said a word when Takin Gthepiss was making "quite some OT posts in
this NG in the past" forging my ID everytime I came up with a new ID.

Even more strange is the fact that someone as you make that remark, but
didn't said a word about the many OT posts of the 3 musquesteers.

My assumption that the Hard-Disk would soon be outdated, was based on
different articles in which diiferent CEO's made a statement like the
one I have showed you and many others as:

Like the one you showed me? Which CEO made such a statement in the
article you quoted?

Yes, like the ones I show you in this post.

1. Microsoft published in a newsletter that they have plans to offer
their software as a "pay per use" item.
"Pay per use" would be like this:

Person "x" decide to have Operating System "x".
He will have to sing a contract with Microsoft in which he will be
charged a certain amount per hour/day/month/year.
In return Microsoft would install (via the Internet) the choossen
Operating System, keep the OS updated, and offer a help-desk line
which is 24/24hrs. This goes for all the software of the Microsoft
range.

Only a tiny part of the Operating System or the choosen software will
be installed to avoid making illegal copies. DLL's and other parts of
the program will be downloaded as needed by the program and erased
when not needed.

So basically these programs would only work if you're online, consumers
would just love that, wouldn't they?

No, but they will have little or no choice if they want to have these
porgrams on their machines.
Thanks to the Software-Copy Industry.
BTW, how many customers are convinced that Windows sucks, but are still
running Windows?

Many software producers (AutoDesk, Adobe, Symantec, etc...) have
published to have a similar view in the future to avoid the illegal
copiyng of their software.

This will reduce the amount of programs in your hard-disk drastical.

Only if these programs wouldn't be downloaded to a HDD when needed,
otherwise one still would need the disc space to run a program.

That's the plan.
You will never have enough files on your hard-disk to make a working copy of
that program.

Anyway programs are hardly using the biggest share of storage space on
home computers, media files (mp3's, jpeg, mpeg, divx etc.) are.

Home computers, maybe.
Business machines, hardly a MP3, mpeg/mpg, divX, and other multimedia file.

2. Several Hardware manufacturers have published newsletters in which
they see the hard-disk capacity reaching their maximum in a very near
future. Only increasing the size (double-hight) would increase the
capacity. They have been pushing the track thickness already to a real
minimum, a minimum in which reliability of reading/storing data will
not be sure anymore.

I think I posted the link before, you might wanna read the part about
perpendicular recording:
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1973348,00.asp

Read the article(s) I've posted today, and if you have time, follow the
links to other similar websites.

3. Manufacturers of portable multimedia devices and car-stereo are
developping or have already developped a serie of equipment which is
using the latest technology.
LCD screens in a car radio or/and the seats, IPod/Microsoft and Zen
with portable multimedia devices, Camera's with built-in DVD-writer or
Hard-Disk, etc...
In the IT-Newsletters, many of them talk about looking for an
alternative for the hard-disk as the storage system, because the hard
disk is still too susceptible on impacts (schokken).
Also, most of the hard-disk manufacturers are giving a guarantee of
maximal 1 year.
Only Seagate gives 5 year warrantee, but if your hard-disk crashes
after 1 year with all your valuable data on it, Seagate will only
replace the defective hard-disk..
Sandisk, Kingston, and many SMD maufacturers offers a life-time
warranty in their solid-state memory devices.

Which all doesn't say anything that HDD's will be obsolete in the near
future, sure in some applications flash will make more sense as I quoted
before:
"Bill Watkins, chief executive of Seagate Technology:
"Flash makes sense where the need for capacity is smaller, where
environmental factors are critical, and where battery life is critical,"
he says. "But there are going to be a lot of places that flash can't
touch, where there are streaming-video applications [and] a hard drive is
the better choice by far. And then there's going to be this middle ground
where we're going to have to fight it out."
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/sep2005/tc20050927_1608
_tc057.htm?

Read the links I've send you today.
I dont have a "glas-bowl" to see in the future, but to me it is clear that
the battle will be in favour for the SMD Memories.
Time will tell who was right or wrong.

4. The demand on computer hardware becomes higher and higher with new
software releases.
Multimedia applications, high-end games, and streaming mutimedia
applications on the internet are demanding more and more stringuent
requirements of the hardware.
The hard-disk will not be able to offer an access time low enough to
run all these applications.
Only memory cards with a capacity of 40-80GB, directly connected to
the system (no USB) will offer the capability to run this software.
Also the power consumption and battery life of portable devices is a
crucial element in the choice of the storage device.

Read the comments by Bill Watson that I quoted earlier.

Read the links I've send you today.

5. As the amount of data to be stored is increasing with the new
technologies, making back-up's becomes a ful time job for most of us.
Many Internet Storage Providers are offering now a storage
capacity to
their users which eliminates the need for Back-up's or huge
Hard-disk's. Specialised companies are offering this kind of service
to Corporate users.

I wouldn't say these offers eliminates the need for Back-up's or huge
Hard-disk's, that would mean users always would have to be online to
access their data. Anyway many "Internet Storage Providers" advertise
their services as a back-up service.

In the public sector, many Internet Providers (Microsoft, Yahoo, and other
Email providers) offers their subscribers 50MB and more to keep their
photo's and other multimedia applications in (Microsoft Web Spaces).
Most of them offer this option for free, but when the client choose for a
"paid subscription", these companies will offer webspace in the GB order.

BTW what do you think these "special companies" are using to store data,
could it be they're HDD's might be part of their storage solutions?

For the moment, yes.
One or more hard-disk RAID.
In the near future, as more and more streaming data is asked by the clients
and SMD Memory will be available at low cost, the hard-disk may be replaced
by SMD memories.

Seagate has some data storage offers too that include online access,
Mirra Sync and Share Personal Servers for instance:
http://www.seagate.com/products/retail/mirra/index.html
Maxtor has a similar a offer:
http://www.ehomeupgrade.com/entry/2678/seagate_now_shipping
These are all "prophecy's" of course, and time will tell if the
hard-disk will be outdated in a near future.


Sure time will tell, but so far you haven't really made a convincing
case for this "prophecy".

I said that I will do a more substancial search WHEN I will have time.
But as you asked so nicely, I offered you today already some links which
sustain my "prophecy".

*****************************
This vision is also bolstered by a recent announcement (July 2005) of
electronic giant Samsung that they will invest heavily in improving their
flash and DRAM production lines and flash SSD equipped laptops. Only time
will tell if we will witness widespread commercial adoption of SSDs.
....BiTMICRO Networks profile

http://www.storagesearch.com/bitmicro-art3.html

********************************


Regards


Regards,


Nick








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