Mechanical hard drives will be eliminated? Graphene will increase the space of mechanical hard drives by 10 times (III)

The arrangement of magnetic particles in the drive, from the initial tiled LMR to later the vertical PMR, to now the infamous imbricated SMR, aims to increase the amount of data that can be stored per unit area.

However, although the imbricated SMR sacrifices the data writing ability, the increase in capacity in exchange is only 25%.

So are there any other ways?

Of course there are.

In the characteristics of mechanical hard drives, if the distance between the magnetic head and the disk is closer, the density of magnetic particles in the drive can also be higher, and the data storage capacity will be greater.

Because each drive needs a protective layer to protect the drive from mechanical damage and to prevent corrosion. This protective layer is generally a carbon-based coating COC, which occupies a large area between the magnetic head and the disk. Part of the space is a high wall for improvement of storage capacity.

So scientists have devoted themselves to studying how to thin COC.

It has been proved that the effect is still very obvious. The thickness of the most advanced commercial COC is only 3nm, and the storage capacity per square inch can reach 1TB.