Cloud storage specialist Backblaze expects the downward worth development for HDDs to proceed. Whereas that will sound like a self-fulfilling prophecy, Backblaze goes additional than merely noting a widely known HDD pricing development: the corporate expects customers to have the ability to buy space for storing at a beforehand unseen $0.01 per GB ratio as quickly as 2025. As least, that is the story in line with Backblaze’s Andy Klein, the corporate’s Precept Storage Cloud Storyteller. With 253,500 HDDs purchased all through its lifetime, Backblaze definitely has the numbers from which to weave a narrative.
Andy Klein analyzed Backblaze’s HDD purchases all through the time the corporate has been working, beginning in 2009. At the moment, Backblaze’s HDD acquisitions had been averaging out at a storage price of round $0.114/GB (for capacities between 1TB and 2TB per HDD). By 2017, with the appearance of 8TB HDDs, that price had fallen by 73% right down to $0.03/GB; within the intervening years and with no small due to ever denser HDDs culminating within the 16TB HDDs the corporate at present acquires, Backblaze has nearly doubled its density/greenback equation by reaching $0.014/GB.
Picture 1 of 3
Klein additionally famous how enhancements in HDD densities often transfer the value downward: from 12TB to 14TB, and 14TB to 16TB, the newer, higher-capacity HDDs are often launched at greater worth factors than the earlier technology merchandise. However finally, higher-density manufacturing know-how permits for the newer product to achieve decrease ground costs.
All in all, the HDD $/GB equation has fallen by 87.4% since 2009, even taking into consideration the 2/yr “blip” from the 2011 Taiwan floods, however most of that fall has occurred since 2017. From 2017 by way of right now, HDD storage density price decreased by as a lot as 56.36%, regardless of the impression of sure HDD-farmed cryptocurrencies and your entire COVID-19 parts disaster.
Based on Klein, we should always count on HDD storage pricing to realize the fabled $0.01/GB by 2025, due to the elevated storage density of 22TB and 24TB HDDs. This could imply that customers in 2025 will be capable of buy one such HDD, which at present has extra space for storing than the typical person would occupy in two lifetimes (disclaimer: at current charges!), for $220 or $240. That is… not loads, comparatively.
HDDs could have been dethroned as the first storage medium on account of their comparatively sluggish efficiency and added supplies price in comparison with NAND-based SSDs, however they nonetheless serve and can proceed to serve their functions for chilly or non-critical storage necessities on account of their greater storage density in comparison with SSDs. And it is easy to see why: the one out there 22TB HDD on Amazon, the 22TB Western Digital Purple Professional at present prices $540 (opens in new tab) (down from its MSRP of $599).
Granted, these are the worst doable situations for that 22TB HDD pricing. It is the most recent, highest out there capability (keep in mind the value premium we talked about above), and there is just one mannequin out there. Nonetheless, 22TB at $540 provides us a $~0.0245/GB pricing. That is nonetheless significantly better than the $0.0745/GB achieved by our Greatest Choose Funds NVMe SSD, the Essential P5 Plus. Even with all the benefits thrown that specific SSD’s means (equivalent to its at present discounted worth at $149,99), its $/GB equation finally ends up on a roughly 200% premium over the Western Digital 22TB HDD. And it definitely might be anticipated for Solidigm’s 61TB SSD to command a a lot greater $/GB than that.