Seagate's new hybrid drive raises some old questions
Summary
Seagate has launched FireCuda Forge, a hybrid storage system that pairs an HDD with a separately supplied NVMe SSD. The system uses Seagate’s Alkemi platform to manage the two drives, but the company has not publicly explained exactly how Alkemi places or caches data.Key Facts
- FireCuda Forge is available from Seagate in 8TB and 20TB HDD configurations priced at $699 and $899.
- Neither configuration includes the SSD required for the hybrid setup.
- The system supports M.2 2280 NVMe SSDs using PCIe Gen3 or newer, with a maximum capacity of 1TB.
- Seagate specifies minimum SSD speeds of 2,400MB/s for reads and 2,000MB/s for writes, and recommends a drive with DRAM cache.
- Seagate claims the combined system can reach read speeds of 2,500MB/s and write speeds of 2,000MB/s.
- The company says Alkemi manages the storage pool from the enclosure and keeps frequently needed content on the SSD.
- The article says storage prices have risen amid increased demand linked to AI, citing examples of SSDs and mechanical drives costing more than their earlier lows.
- Unlike Apple’s Fusion Drive, which used macOS-managed tiering, Alkemi’s specific data-management method is not detailed in the product materials described in the article.
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