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--></style></head><body lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple style='word-wrap:break-word'><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal>3.5 inch hard drives are far from obsolete. 2.5 inch drives were used primarily in laptops, all-in-one systems (e.g. iMac) and small form factor desktops (e.g. Mac mini) where they have been pretty much entirely replaced by SSDs in all but the cheapest systems. With the latest generation, games consoles have also shifted to SSDs.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>The main application for hard drives now is backup and storage of large volumes of data, such as videos. 3.5 inch drives store more data because their platters are bigger, though there are still plenty of 2.5 inch drives being sold for external use for backup or home network storage. I like to keep local, non-cloud backups of all my photos and backups of my computer disks. For that I run a desktop computer, which has a 2TB SSD for most of my data, an internal 4TB 3.5 inch hard drive for photos and video, and an external 8TB 3.5 inch hard drive to give an extra level of backup.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>You can buy an 18TB “enterprise grade” high reliability 3.5 inch hard drive for about what you’d pay for a 2TB high performance NVMe module. So for companies with a lot of data to store, hard drives still make sense for larger, less frequently accessed data or for the kind of backup and archival operations that used to be done with optical disk, magnetoptical disks, or tape.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Best wishes,<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Tom<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal> <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><div style='border:none;border-top:solid #E1E1E1 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in'><p class=MsoNormal><b>From:</b> Members <members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org> <b>On Behalf Of </b>Jonathan Coopersmith<br><b>Sent:</b> Wednesday, January 5, 2022 12:26 AM<br><b>To:</b> SIGCIS <members@sigcis.org><br><b>Subject:</b> [SIGCIS-Members] use of 3.5 inch hard drives<o:p></o:p></p></div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif'>A recent post asked for information about any current uses of 3.5 inch hard drives. My son recently gave me these for a birthday present.<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif;color:#222222'>Stay sane and get a booster (partially for you; more for others),</span><span style='font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif'> </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif'>Jonathan</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif'>Jonathan Coopersmith</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif'>Professor</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif'>Department of History</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif'>Texas A&M University</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif'>College Station, TX 77843-4236</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif'>979.739.4708 (cell)</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif'>979.862.4314 (fax)</span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif'>Voting challenges: </span><span style='color:#222222'><a href="https://theeagle.com/opinion/columnists/texas-should-be-the-model-for-secure-voting/article_4c35a332-e42c-11eb-b0d8-534c59b58ebe.html" target="_blank">https://theeagle.com/opinion/columnists/texas-should-be-the-model-for-secure-voting/article_4c35a332-e42c-11eb-b0d8-534c59b58ebe.html</a></span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif'>Preserving space archives: <a href="https://www.toboldlypreserve.space/" target="_blank">https://www.toboldlypreserve.space/</a></span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>International standards battles: <a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/geek-life/history/lets-thwart-this-terrible-idea-for-standards-setting__;!!KwNVnqRv!R4dbJx9DOnSkoiNAwXjHq9sp5vMvdGEVtOMlWJUc6AH7iQiRA7bw1VEUYeo6i2St9sgf$" target="_blank"><span style='color:#1155CC'>https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/geek-life/history/lets-thwart-this-terrible-idea-for-standards-setting</span></a><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><i><span style='font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif'>FAXED. The Rise and Fall of the Fax Machine</span></i><span style='font-family:"Verdana",sans-serif'> (Johns Hopkins University Press) </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:12.0pt'><br><br><br><o:p></o:p></p></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></body></html>