Innovative hard drive introduced by Seagate

Seagate Technology has introduced the launch of the Mozaic 3+ hard drive platform, which it claims to be a significant achievement in the storage industry.

The solution features Seagate’s implementation of heat-assisted magnetic recording (HAMR) technology.

According to Seagate, this launch signifies unprecedented areal densities of 3TB+ per platter and sets the stage for future advancements, aiming for 4TB+ and 5TB+ per platter in the years to come.

Data storage

The Mozaic 3+ platform powers Seagate’s flagship Exos product family, now offering industry-leading capacity points of 30TB and beyond, with Exos 30TB+ products already in volume shipments to hyperscale cloud customers this quarter.

The company‘s claimed innovation in areal density, enhancing the storage capacity on a platter, aims to tackle common challenges in the industry.

With Mozaic 3+, customers can now store more data in the same physical space than previously possible.

Upgrading from a 16TB conventional perpendicular magnetic recording (PMR) drive, the average capacity in large-scale data centres, to an Exos 30TB Mozaic 3+ technology drive effectively doubles capacity within the same footprint.

This platform utilises similar material components as PMR hard drives but significantly increases capacity, leading to substantial reductions in storage acquisition and operational costs for data centres, including a 40% improvement in per terabyte power consumption.

Moreover, Mozaic 3+ contributes to sustainability goals, a key focus for large-scale data centres, by offering a 55% reduction in embodied carbon per terabyte when compared to a traditional 16TB PMR drive.

Hard drive addresses industry challenges

According to the company, Seagate is witnessing robust demand from data centre customers, anticipating the qualification completion of Mozaic 3+ and a transition to volume ramp by the end of this quarter.

A cloud service provider is actively prioritising the adoption of Mozaic 3+ for the majority of Seagate-provided drives, underscoring their confidence in the technology.

Dave Mosley, CEO, Seagate commented: “Seagate is the world’s only hard drive manufacturer with the areal density capability to get to 3TB per platter and with 5TB on the horizon.

“As AI use cases put a premium on raw data sets, more companies are going to need to store all the data they can.

“To accommodate the resulting masses of data, areal density matters more than ever.

“The Mozaic 3+ platform represents more than just HAMR technology.

“It comprises several industry-first innovations that we’ve integrated to help us scale areal density.”

Mozaic 3+ breakthrough technologies

• Superlattice platinum-alloy media: Mozaic 3+ employs a pioneering iron-platinum superlattice structure in its media alloy, enhancing magnetic coercivity for precise data writing and unprecedented bit stability, addressing the challenge of nanoscale grain instability
• Plasmonic writer: To counter media instability, Mozaic 3+ incorporates a revolutionary plasmonic writer, featuring Seagate’s unique implementation of HAMR with a nanophotonic laser, ensuring reliable data writing through the creation of infinitesimal heat spots on the media surface
• Gen 7 spintronic reader: Mozaic 3+ integrates one of the world’s smallest and most sensitive magnetic field reading sensors, utilising quantum technology to read smaller grains of written data effectively
• 12nm integrated controller: The system on a chip integrated controller, developed in-house, efficiently orchestrates Mozaic 3+’s advanced technologies, delivering up to three times the performance compared to previous solutions

“Improvements are critical”

John Rydning, Research Vice President, IDC mentioned: “Hard drive areal density improvements are critical for economically and efficiently expanding the installed base of hard drive-based mass storage, especially in data centres.

“Seagate’s innovative areal density breakthrough is timely and will enable it to deliver increasingly higher capacity hard drive products for many years.”

Beyond data centres, Seagate‘s Mozaic 3+ storage technology will empower diverse applications, spanning from enterprise and edge computing to NAS (Network Attached Storage) and the video and imaging applications (VIA) markets.