Cerabyte, a company that develops data storage solutions using ceramic nanolayers, has released a video showcasing its ceramics-based data storage technology that aims to completely transform how enterprise data centers store and access data.
Rather than relying on traditional hard disk drives (HDDs) or solid state drives (SSDs), Cerabyte leverages ceramic material combined with glass to enable extremely high-density data storage at a fraction of the cost.
How Does The Ceramics-Based Storage Technology Work?
Cerabyte’s prototype system features storage cartridges made of Gorilla Glass with a thin ceramic layer that stores data. The cartridges are housed in a robotic library and automatically transferred to a read/write rack when data access is required.
To write data, a cartridge’s data carrier is precisely positioned, and 2 million laser beamlets rapidly etch nano-scale QR code-like patterns representing binary data into the ceramic surface at blazing fast speeds up to GBps.
The patterns are immediately verified by a microscopic camera integrated into the write assembly. Reading data works similarly, with the camera accurately scanning the durable ceramic patterns.
Massive Storage Density and Practically Unlimited Durability
While not yet matching top-tier HDDs and SSDs in performance, Cerabyte aims to scale up capacity to previously unfathomable levels. A standard palm-sized cartridge could store an astounding 10,000TB, for example.
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The ceramic storage also enables hugely greater areal densities of TB/square-centimeter compared to even the most advanced HDDs and SSDs.
Additionally, Cerabyte touts the ceramic storage medium lasts over 5,000 years while using literally no energy for data retention. This represents a dramatic durability and cost advantage over HDDs and SSDs that require replacement every 2-5 years on average.
Ceramics Technology Brings Breakthrough Potential
By leveraging robust, advanced ceramics rather than silicon, Cerabyte’s highly innovative approach promises scalability, density, speed and longevity that could genuinely revolutionize data center storage as we know it. If the technology continues along its current development trajectory, it could readily become the next dominant enterprise storage paradigm within the next 5-10 years.
While still in the early prototype stage, the future implications of a commercially viable ceramics-based storage system are enormous when one considers the virtually unlimited room for growth capacity and performance.
Cerabyte’s technology could realistically achieve 1,000x gains over even the highest-end storage systems today in time. The company still has work ahead to improve their platform, but they have clearly demonstrated a functioning ceramics-based storage system could very soon be a reality.
