HDD Short Stroked Portion Mirroring SSD Data
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Solution Overview
Problem
The high cost of solid state drives (SSDs) compared to traditional hard disk drives (HDDs) makes complete replacement with SSDs cost-prohibitive, and existing redundancy mechanisms require additional SSDs, increasing costs further.
Innovation Solution
Utilizing the short stroked portion of HDDs as a mirrored copy for SSDs, where a small band of cylinders at the outer diameter of HDDs is reserved for mirroring SSD data, reducing seek time and allowing fewer SSDs to be used while maintaining performance and redundancy.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Speed
If SSDs are used to replace HDDs, then data access speed is improved, but system cost increases
Solution Approach 1:
The invention segments the storage system into two parts: SSDs for frequently accessed critical data and a portion of HDD capacity for mirrored copy storage. This segmentation allows the system to achieve high-speed access for important data while using cheaper HDD storage for redundancy, thereby reducing overall system cost while maintaining performance benefits.
Solution Approach 2:
The invention uses copying by creating a mirrored copy of SSD data on HDD storage. This allows the system to maintain fast access speeds by reading from SSDs while using the copied data on HDDs for redundancy purposes, eliminating the need to purchase additional expensive SSDs for backup purposes.
2Reliability
If redundancy is implemented using additional SSDs, then data reliability is improved, but system cost increases
Solution Approach 1:
The invention creates a mirrored copy of SSD data on a portion of HDD storage capacity. This copying approach provides full redundancy and reliability benefits while using cheaper HDD storage instead of additional expensive SSDs, thereby significantly reducing the system cost while maintaining data reliability.
Solution Approach 2:
The invention uses HDD storage for the mirrored copy portion, which is a cheaper storage medium compared to SSDs. While HDDs have moving parts and shorter lifespan, they are sufficient for redundancy purposes where high-speed access is not critical, providing cost-effective reliability.
3Quantity of substance
If the entire HDD capacity is used for storage, then storage capacity is maximized, but data access speed decreases
Solution Approach 1:
The invention segments the HDD capacity into two portions: one portion for mirrored copy of SSD data (where high-speed access is needed for redundancy) and the remaining portion for additional storage capacity. This segmentation allows the system to maintain fast access speeds for critical data while maximizing overall storage capacity using the slower HDD medium for non-critical storage.
Solution Approach 2:
The invention applies local quality by reserving a specific portion of HDD capacity (the short stroked portion) for high-speed mirrored copy operations while using the rest of the HDD capacity for standard-speed additional storage. This allows different quality levels of storage performance within the same HDD device.
Data Source
AI summary
Mechanisms for storing data to a storage system comprising a set of one or more solid state storage devices and a set of non-solid state storage devices are provided. A request to write data to the storage system is received and the data is written to the set of one or more solid state storage devices in response to receiving the request. Moreover, a mirror copy of the data is written to the set of non-solid state storage devices in response to receiving the request. Thus, the non-solid state storage devices serve as a mirror backup copy of the data stored to the solid state storage devices.