Seagate spins off a bit of cash from slowing disk drive business

Seagate's MACH.2 dual-actuator tech will begin shipping later this calendar year, starting "around" the 20TB capacity point, the firm's CEO Dave Mosley has confirmed. Competitor Western Digital is also developing dual-actuator technology to increase disk drive IO rates. Seagate's tech chief made the remarks to analysts on the …

[Stephen McLaughlin]

Dwindling Market for HDDs but still kicking - in part thanks to the Cloud Configurations

I've installed a few of these on-prem cloud systems in the past few years, namely IBM Cloud Object Storage and they consist of very large storage arrays with high-capacity, slower RPM drives. Mind you almost everything front-end is SSD. The interesting thing with the separate arrays is they are configured as a single large storage unit (in some cases over multiple sites). So thousands of HDDs are configured like a giant RAID array. The performance is amazing, and because of a high level of fault tolerance, they are also replacing traditional backup.

[Dvon of Edzore]

Re: Dwindling Market for HDDs but still kicking - in part thanks to the Cloud Configurations

"... because of a high level of fault tolerance, they are also replacing traditional backup."

No, they aren't. RAID is still a mortal object created and used by imperfect mortal beings. The maintenance job that purges the most recent 30 days of transactions instead of the most ancient, the malware that scrambles the master customer table everything else is keyed to, the server update that (oopsie!) deletes the emails subpoenaed by the government-agency-you-fear-most - your fancy new storage system will quickly, reliably, and permanently propagate those changes to the far corners of your empire as faithfully as it does the latest self-congratulatory missive from CEO Wonderful.

The RAID too big to fail because it's too big to backup is simply too big. 3-2-1 is not just an old TV show, and you'll find the Nile crocodiles a lot friendlier than the enraged multitudes who come looking for a scapegoat when the backup you were told isn't needed is suddenly needed.

My philosophy is, any disaster small enough to leave someone to inherit the company should leave enough backups to rebuild the IT part of the company.

[baka]

Would be hilarious if they spun off the hilariously terrible acquisitions made under Phil Brace's watch. As an ex-Seagate employee that was in the SSD side of things, I'd be surprised if they found a stupor.. errr suitor to take the SSD interests. Xyratex team is all but gone. There's still some StorageTek guys, but its a shell. I just don't see what assets are left to spin out for any real cash compared to their investment.

[Anonymous Coward]

Pah, Seagate - quality very questionable

OK, a domestic problem, but the only HDDs I have ever had fail in the past 10 years have been Seagate. Hitachi and Toshiba just keep on working.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Pah, Seagate - quality very questionable

Is it just me, or did Seagate's reliability in general take a nosedive around the time they took over Maxtor? (Which didn't have a good reputation at that point, and which was presumably integrated into Seagate's manufacturing and supply chain under the new name).

[Doctor Syntax]

"The disk drive business's revenues have remained more or less flat"

Disks are supposed to be flat.

Mines the one with the round pockets.