Seagate achieves the HDD storage density milestone of 1 terabit (1 trillion bits) pers square inch using Heat-Assisted Magnetic Recording (HAMR), an achievement it compares to the number of stars in the Milky Way.
As the company puts it "the bits within a square inch of disk space, at the new milestone, far outnumber stars in the Milky Way, which astronomers put between 200 billion and 400 billion."
The data density reached is 55% higher than the current area density ceiling of 620 gigabits per square inch.
Seagate says the first generation of commercially available HAMR HDDs will double current capacities-- creating 6TB 3.5" drives and 2TB 2.5" drives, with theoretical areal density limits ranging from 5 to 10 terabits per square inch.
