How to save the power consumption of hard disk

When it comes to the power consumption of traditional hard disks, two major projects need to be considered. The first is the power consumption of the mechanical parts: it includes a rotary motor to drive the solid disc and a head drive arm (actuator) for locating the read-write head. More power is required to achieve a higher rotational speed, and the demand for electricity also depends on the disc diameter, the number of platters and the bearings used.

Achieving shorter access times also consumes more power because the head drive arm must be quickly accelerated and braked to move the head from one surface position to another. The number of platters also affects the power consumption requirements of the head-drive arm, since each two-head (each side of each platter has a single head) is positioned to match a head-driven arm.

Performance features such as Native Command Queuing (NCQ) may contribute to the power-saving level of the load state. NCQ arranges all incoming commands, analyzes them, and rearranges them in a way that minimizes the head movement, but the NCQ is important in the server environment.

The second important field of hard disk power consumption is the circuit board with controller, cache and interface logic. Improving component integration has made hard core logic more energy efficient, but the degree of power saving cannot be excluded from the calculation formula.

It is obvious that electricity saving can be done from the physical level, such as reducing speed or slowing the acceleration and braking efficiency of the head drive arm. The optimization of the bearing design is much more difficult, since most of the hard drives have already adopted liquid bearings (FDB). The use of newer, lighter materials also helps reduce power consumption, but robustness and reliability are a big problem that cannot be underestimated, and the thickness of the platters affects other levels (for example, to ensure smooth rotation), so these parameters are not adjustable at will. On the PCB (printed circuit board), of course, like other silicon 0 components to deploy power-saving mechanisms, such as caching, such as the use of logic, you can temporarily shut down.