New HDD read heads could significantly boost capacity

Sure, your hard drive does an okay job, spinning around, hefting 200 gigabits per square inch, but wouldn't you know it, the sensors used to read all that data are reaching their physical limits. Enter the National Physical Laboratory in Teddington, UK, where researchers are proposing a whole new sensor design that could result in much thinner and smaller read heads, leading to drives with data densities as high as one terabit per square inch. According to the researchers, the sensors would use less power than current read heads, and could improve the speed of the reader. In the words of lead researcher Marian Vopsaroiu, "You could read back data ten times faster... instead of one GHz, you can read at five to ten GHz." Currently, hard drives use the magneto-resistance effect to read data, needing a constant current which converts resistance to voltage. The new sensors work by using the magneto-electric effect, wherein data's magnetic field will directly generate voltage instead of resistance. The new heads will be smaller and lighter as well, using half as many layers of materials as current sensors, but there are difficulties in putting together the complex alloys of the tiny readers. Want to know all the truly techy details? Grab a cup of strong coffee and hit the read link.

[Ant @ Sep 12th 2007 2:22PM]

It never ceases to amaze me how primitive the idea of a silicon record player is, but at the same time how effective they are at storing data. How the hell to they manufacture these things so small. Well it’s good news for the iPod Touch 2gen, maybe they will put one of these low power versions in and give us a proper storage device.

[macona @ Sep 14th 2007 3:46PM]

Silicon? Platters are made from aluminum or glass.

[yenom @ Sep 12th 2007 2:28PM]

Sounds good, but stateless is the future!

[p3ngwin @ Sep 12th 2007 2:35PM]

stateless?
WTF?
you mean something that has no state, as in has no existence? lol

i think that you mean "solid state", as in solid state drive. or maybe, just maybe, you mean quantum mechanics computing for data storage, when we will be using "qu-bits" that have a binary state at the same time.

which has TWO states at the same time...so no i have no idea what you mean i guess
:)

[michael @ Sep 12th 2007 2:37PM]

Do you mean solid state?

[Sly Raskal @ Sep 12th 2007 2:52PM]

ROFL @ stateless.

Binary would cease to exist if we had stateless. Everything would be a 0. Divide by 0's would be rampant! ROFL!

like others have said, it's probably solid state that you were referring to.

[yenom @ Sep 12th 2007 5:03PM]

Whoops! I meant solid state.

[tylersmyler @ Sep 12th 2007 2:34PM]

You know,

I wish they spent more time on developing high capacity flash drives instead of these delicate needles and spinning plates.

Why must we use moving parts to store data when we don't have to anymore?

When will the day come when we all have flash based solid state drives?? Please tell me soon.

[Peter @ Sep 12th 2007 2:45PM]

tylersmyler - You can have it now, it's just really expensive.

[Eli L @ Sep 12th 2007 3:34PM]

Technology and manufacturing is already established for disk-platter hard drives, so it would take money to switch over to something else. I'm fine with current hard drives, it's not like I drop my entire computer on the floor everyday, so flash isn't really necessary. For the laptop, however...

[ethana2 @ Sep 12th 2007 4:59PM]

Why do we have RAM when we could load up with 4 GB of L2?

Cost effectiveness is tiered. I think you would be quite satisfied with a 2TB HDD, 4 GB of flash, 4 GB of ram, and 8 MB of L2. ;)

[Jake @ Sep 12th 2007 3:19PM]

"You could read back data ten times faster... instead of one GHz, you can read at five to ten GHz."

GHz ?

/

Marian Vopsaroiu sounds like a romanian name. Sa traiesti omule!

[Shadyman @ Sep 12th 2007 4:01PM]

As in billions of cycles per second, Yes.

[Jake @ Sep 12th 2007 3:25PM]

"You could read back data ten times faster... instead of one GHz, you can read at five to ten GHz."

GHz ?

/

Marian Vopsaroiu sounds like a romanian name. Sa traiesti omule!

[Jake @ Sep 12th 2007 3:27PM]

Sorry for the double post , i refreshed quite a couple of times and it didn't show up.

[Benson @ Sep 12th 2007 3:51PM]

GHz

G = 10^9
Hz = cycles/s

GHz makes perfect sense here.

[Jake @ Sep 12th 2007 6:12PM]

Ah , i see . thanks! Shadyman, you too!

[Lumiere @ Sep 13th 2007 12:31PM]

Yes, indeed, Marian Vopsaroiu it's romanian man....
Jake si tu esti roman?

[engadget @ Sep 12th 2007 4:42PM]

Different companies , Different goals.

[engadget @ Sep 12th 2007 4:47PM]

This was supposed to be a reply to tylersmyler "I wish they spent more time on developing high capacity flash drives instead of these delicate needles and spinning plates. "

[The Drizzle @ Sep 13th 2007 7:57AM]

rock and roll man

[ShadowVlican @ Sep 14th 2007 11:16PM]

whatever helps to store more pr0n...