Table Salt Could Help Boost HDD Storage Density By a Factor of 5

hypnosec writes "A team of researchers has managed to boost storage density on traditional magnetic platters as high as 3.3 terabits per square inch using a technique that relies on NaCl — table salt. (Comparatively, a recent 4TB Seagate drive had an areal density of 625Gb per square inch.) A research team used a technique called nanopatterning to create arrays of magnetic bits that have more regular features (PDF) than the current traditional, randomly distributed technique. Team leader Joel Yang compares the technique to a well known traveling trick; 'It's like packing your clothes in your suitcase when you travel. The neater you pack them the more you can carry.' Yang said, 'In the same way, the team of scientists has used nanopatterning to closely pack more of the miniature structures that hold information in the form of bits, per unit area.'"

Does it boost my memory too?

[Anonymous Coward]

Does it boost my memory too? Maybe I should eat some more.

Important note:

[Baloroth]

Do not try this at home. Pouring table salt on your hard drive platters will not improve their storage density.

Re:Important note:

[Anonymous Coward]

But it makes them more delicious

Re:Metaphors

[MozeeToby]

The whole time I was reading the analogy I was expecting him to finish with "That is a very graphic analogy which aids understanding wonderfully while being, strictly speaking, wrong in every possible way." With apologies to Sir Pterry.

Re:Important note:

[RoverDaddy]

No petabytes, because peta would object to the exploitation of shrimp.

This tech has culinary and security implications

[idontgno]

if you use the platters to cook your shredded potatoes for breakfast while computing and storing cryptographic trapdoor values, you'll discover...

<sunglasses>

your hashes are already salted.

YEEEEAAAAAAAHHH