SSDs have long been the norm in PCs and laptops, but traditional hard drives still make a lot of sense, especially if you have extensive storage needs.
This is demonstrated by the new 26TB Western Digital Ultrastar drives, which are aimed at business systems, but are accompanied by several models of 22TB capacity. "Suck that, SSD," those drives seem to be saying.
More capacity thanks to the use of SMR technology
The 26 TB Western Digital Ultrastar DC HC670 are the clear protagonists of a launch that is also interesting for the 22TB Ultrastar DC HC570 version, also aimed at data centers.
Accompanying these models are WD Red Pro (for NAS9), WD Purple Pro (for video surveillance), and WD Gold (business hard drive) drives, all of which are also 22TB in capacity.
The DC HC670, yes, use SMR (Shingled Magnetic Recording) technology, which sacrifices some performance in order to increase the data density on each disk of the hard drive. That same technology is used in the WD Red Pro, for example, and it's a good compromise for those business environments.
Precisely for this reason, the DC HC570 is also interesting, which, despite having a little less capacity, does use CMR (Conventional Recording Recording) technology, which allows access to better transfer rates both in reading and writing. We've seen 20TB CMR drives, but here WD sets an important precedent..
New WD_Black SSDs
Accompanying these traditional hard drives are also enterprise SSD drives. The UltraStar DC SN650 is a unit with up to 15.36 TB, PCIe interface and is available in both 2.5-inch drive and E1.L format, specifically oriented to be used in server racks.
We also have new drives in the WD_Black family for end users. The SN850X is a PCIe 4.0 drive with up to 4 TB and read speeds of up to 7,300 MB/s.
The WD_Black P40 Game Drive is an external SSD of up to 2 TB intended for use in new generation consoles, and promises 2,000 MB/s reads.
Another interesting unit is the PC SN740, a model very designed for OEMs and manufacturers with read rates of up to 5,150 MB/s. It makes use of the M.2 2230 format (30 mm long), very popular in laptops or tablets, and which is also used in Steam Decks, for example.
