IBM has announced the its new storage technology could replace both hard disks and solid state drives (SSD)in less than ten years.
According to IBM
the technology, know as Racetrack memory, combines the speed and
durability of flash drives with the capacity and reduced cost of
traditional platter drives. Racetrack is so named because it uses
magnetic boundaries to channel data, meaning that instead of the
computer going to find the data is effectively shuttled to a place
where it can be used.
Like flash drives Racetrack contains no moving parts, but unlike
flash in which every write damages the circuits - Racetrack would not
be worn down by usage, prolonging its life considerably.
Alongside this all the usual next generation hardware benefits are
being touted by Big Blue, including reduced heat, longer battery life,
and increased storage, possibly up to a hundred times that of current
devices.
The team described the technology in the journal Science.
Wouldn't it be great to have an external hard drive with this type of technology? Not only would it be really fast, but also durable and also last a long time. Hard drives are still very unreliable, especially when they are moved around. The chance of dropping a hard drive that is in a hard drive case or caddy greatly increases if it is not stored safely inside a computer. But with some type of solid state hard drive, and external drive will be very robust.