With the rapid development of the internet, streaming media has become the mainstream form of online content. The foundation of these services is servers, and one of the most critical pieces of hardware is hard drives. Many companies face the question of whether mechanical hard drives can be used for streaming services. While this question may seem simple, it actually involves multiple factors, including performance, capacity, cost, and business needs. The answer isn't a simple "yes" or "no." To clarify this, a thorough analysis combining the characteristics of streaming media with the properties of hard drives is necessary.
The core of streaming media lies in real-time performance and smoothness. Whether a user orders a movie on demand or tens of thousands of people simultaneously watch a live broadcast online, streaming platforms must ensure stable and high-speed data transmission. Hard drives perform both data storage and access. Inadequate hard drive performance can lead to slow loading times, lags, and even freezes. Mechanical hard drives offer the advantages of large capacity and low price, allowing them to easily store terabytes or more of data. However, their disadvantages are also significant: because they rely on mechanical heads and platters for reading and writing, they have low I/O performance, with random read and write speeds far inferior to those of solid-state drives (SSDs). Streaming services, on the other hand, demand fast response times and high concurrency, which makes mechanical hard drives inherently vulnerable. If a server is solely responsible for cold data storage, such as video backup, archiving, or preserving historical footage, then a mechanical hard drive is perfectly adequate. Its large storage capacity and low unit cost make it suitable for long-term storage of infrequently accessed data. However, for real-time streaming media distribution, especially when high-concurrency users are simultaneously requesting the same video, a mechanical hard drive can become a bottleneck. Mechanical hard drives experience significant performance degradation under high concurrency due to seek latency and rotational speed limitations, resulting in choppy video playback. Once the user experience is compromised, the platform struggles to retain viewers.
On the other hand, streaming services rely not only on hard drive read speeds but also on bandwidth and caching mechanisms. Modern streaming architectures often utilize CDN distribution, cache nodes, and memory buffers to reduce direct reliance on hard drives. In this scenario, mechanical hard drives can still serve as the storage medium for origin servers, but only if sufficient caching and distribution systems are in place to compensate for the drive's performance limitations. Relying solely on mechanical hard drives to support real-time user access is extremely risky. Once concurrency increases, slow speeds and poor stability become apparent.
When considering whether mechanical hard drives are suitable for streaming services, the scale of the business also needs to be considered. For small platforms with a limited number of users and relatively manageable access volume, budgets are tight, so mechanical hard drives can be used as a transitional step, combined with appropriate caching and bandwidth solutions to mitigate the pressure. However, for medium- to large-scale platforms facing tens of thousands of concurrent accesses, mechanical hard drives alone are barely sufficient. SSDs, or even NVMe SSDs, are essential to ensure high I/O performance. SSDs can maintain stable read and write speeds even in highly concurrent scenarios, something mechanical hard drives simply cannot match.
From a cost perspective, mechanical hard drives are indeed attractive. For platforms that need to store large amounts of video files, mechanical hard drives can significantly reduce storage costs. However, storage is only part of the streaming experience; the true determinant of the user experience lies in read speed and delivery capabilities. Sacrificing performance for cost savings may ultimately be counterproductive. Many companies adopt a hybrid model, using mechanical hard drives for video source files and cold data storage, while using SSDs for hot data storage and transcoding cache. This approach strikes a balance between cost and performance, and is very common in streaming services.
Another factor to consider is future growth. With the rise in popularity of 4K, 8K, and even VR video, video files are growing in size, necessitating ever-higher read and write speeds for hard drives. While mechanical hard drives (HDDs) can meet capacity requirements, they are increasingly struggling to keep up. With falling prices and technological advancements, SSDs have become the mainstream choice. Many data centers in Hong Kong and overseas already use SSDs as standard server configurations, with HDDs primarily used for expansion storage. If you plan to develop a streaming business long-term, choosing SSDs is a more forward-looking option.
From a reliability perspective, HDDs, due to their mechanical structure, are susceptible to wear and damage, and their long-term stability and lifespan are inferior to SSDs. Streaming services often require 24/7 operation, and a hard drive failure poses a significant risk of data loss or service interruption. This is one reason many companies are reluctant to rely solely on HDDs.
Overall, whether HDDs are suitable for servers used in streaming services depends on the business's focus and use case. For simple cold storage and data backup, HDDs remain an economical and reasonable choice. However, for real-time distribution and high-concurrency access, HDDs are insufficient, and SSDs, or even NVMe SSDs, are essential for guaranteed performance. A more reasonable solution is to use a combination of mechanical hard drives and SSDs: SSDs for core business data and cache, and mechanical hard drives for mass storage and backup. This model is both economical and provides a balance between performance and stability.
