Western Digital's "Green" Hard Drives 187
MojoKid writes "Eco-friendly or 'green' products are becoming much more fashionable these
days, especially in things like high-end electronics, where the impact on the
environment and the disposal of these products is being regulated now by such
things as the RoHS compliance standard. In addition, power consumption is also
being looked at more closely for all the obvious reasons. Hard Drive
manufacturer Western Digital recently took the initiative by being the first
drive manufacture to produce and market
a lower power version of their Caviar line of hard drives. The
numbers here show that a green hard drive will probably only save an average
end user about 10 watts in total system power consumption. However, from a
data center perspective, where demand for storage is growing by the petabyte at
an alarming rate, 10 watts per drive can certainly add up quickly."
Ads up (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:SSD power consumption ? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:SSD power consumption ? (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Ads up (Score:3, Insightful)
During general use (web browsing, chatting, online java games like settlers of catan, etc) it uses around 40-45Watts.
This is switching from a PC that used between 110-120watts for the same thing.
You can save a lot if you shop smart.
The best part is I spent under $500 on the whole machine.
The other best part is machines that efficient are also completely silent without spending big money on super silent fans. I am using stock cooling on it.
Re:86400 Watts*Hours (Score:4, Insightful)
saving 10 watts! (Score:5, Insightful)
Also with less power the drives should run cooler, this would really increase drive reliability.
I found most CoLo servers don't properly cool their drives especially 1U servers, where it seems I loose a few every year, but at home I can run those same drives for 5 years or more. Even the desktop servers I run in a dusty shed that freeze in the winter and bakes in the summer the drives are more reliable then the ones running in a CoLo with constant 50 degree super clean air, just because drives in 1U's run hotter constantly and under a heaver load.
RoHS is another story, it's been a somewhat difficult transition, unexpectedly is make passing FCC compliance more difficult because for the exact same board layout it had higher RF emissions. Don't know why, wonder if others have also seen that.
I don't see how RoHS is going to be any more "green", the largest change is moving away from tin/lead to Lead-free solders that contain some mix of tin, copper, silver, bismuth, indium, zinc, and antimony.
It's more expensive, and brittle which could decrease reliablity.
If the circuit boards are actually getting recycled instead of landfilled, it wouldn't make much difference anyhow.
Re:watts != Green (Score:3, Insightful)
You're being too cynical. Any reduction is beneficial and can result in less use of "dirtier" sources, even if you're not directly powered by them.
Re:watts != Green (Score:5, Insightful)
Wrong Standard? (Score:3, Insightful)
RoHS says which materials can be used in construction, WEEE covers disposal. (In the EU at least)
Re:Hey dumbass (Score:3, Insightful)
Now open your eyes and start acting responsibly, recycle your own waste in U.S and stop dumping/selling it around the world.
Re:The earth is worth it! (Score:3, Insightful)
But whatever we improve, IT still represents an ecological disaster.
Take a look at every tech stuff around you. Where will they be in 5 years? Surely not around anymore!
Obviously, those "green drives" are better than nothing, but in some years, nobody will want to use any 1TB hard drive anymore, and this improvement in power consumption only took place because millions of hard drive have been produced.
Just like for cars, we reduce the environmental impact of each product separately thanks to economies of scale, but what really matters is the global impact. And it sadly just keeps growing.
Re:Even older technologies are eating less power.. (Score:3, Insightful)
Typically thinner filaments are more efficient but more fragile. If they developed a filament material that is less fragile and thinner it would be a serious breakthrough.
Re:Review at the register: Not so good. (Score:3, Insightful)
As noted, it's byt far the quietest and coolest drive I've ever used, aprticularly when seeking. I'm prepared to wait an extra half hour in an eight hour rsync job if that's the case. It's just a case of priorities; fast, quiet, cheap. Pick any two. Balls to the wall performance has never been the be-all and end-all for any component in the consumer arena IME.
Re:SSD power consumption ? (Score:3, Insightful)
OH, if you're looking for an ANSWER, that would be that an SSD takes on average 50% of the power, but perhaps 1/3 to 1/5 of the capacity of a similar form-factor hard drive. Meaning that per-drive they use less and per gig they use more.
heat isn't so bad (Score:3, Insightful)