SSD Grows, HDD Slows

Solid-state drives (SSDs) continued to outpace hard disk drive (HDD) sales by a wide margin last year and will grow even more popular in 2014, according to industry reports.

Infostor, a storage industry publisher, reported shipments of SSDs grew by 82 percent in 2013 to 57 million units. There is a 50 percent increase forecast this year with an expectation that shipments in 2017 will hit nearly 190 million units.

The SSD totals still are much smaller than the HDD market, which is huge, but slowing.

Infostor reported HDD shipments of 444 million last year. That’s a 7 percent decline from the previous year. The forecast for 2017 annual sales is for another sharp falloff to 397 million units.

Infostor based its information on reports from IHS, a technology analysis and information provider.

Billions More ‘Net Connections
Sales of Internet-connected devices are expected to move past 6 billion per year in 2014, according to IHS. That’s a 6 percent rise from 2013 when 5.82 billion units were sold.

The increase comes from sales of a wide variety of devices, including cellphones, tablets, computers, and computers, online gaming platforms, Internet-connected TVs and set-top boxes.

The improved growth this year, of the connected devices industry, marks the return of higher production as manufacturers deliver all sorts of connectivity equipment to users,” said Jagdish Rebello, senior director of information technology for IHS.

Given the voracious appetite of consumers for social media and their yen for always-on connectivity, it’s little surprise that makers will continue to turn out such devices to keep buyers engaged,” Rebello concluded.