The bigger takeaway is that hard drives, often treated as a legacy technology, are once again being pulled into the center of the industry's growth story. Between China's shifting procurement priorities and the AI sector's insatiable appetite for data storage, spinning disks are experiencing demand dynamics few would have predicted just a couple of years ago. Whether this turns into a sustained pricing cycle or a temporary squeeze will depend on how quickly capacity expands, and whether AI infrastructure spending continues at its current breakneck pace.
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Zak Killian Contributor Zak is a freelance contributor to Tom's Hardware with decades of PC benchmarking experience who has also written for HotHardware and The Tech Report. A modern-day Renaissance man, he may not be an expert on anything, but he knows just a little about nearly everything.
HAZERD2 Looks like they are trying to push us to use cloud tech to steal all our data. Grim outlooks for budget PC building Reply
pjmelect The next shortage will probably be computer cases and powers supplies. Reply
bigdragon I really hope things go back to normal in a year or two. This AI craze has gotten so ridiculous that simply visiting a theme park or grocery store permits your likeness to be used for AI training. Hollywood made all sorts of movies warning about the surveillance state a decade or two ago. Now it's happening for real, but the companies are the ones using such tech for dystopian purposes instead of the government. The AI bubble can't pop soon enough! Reply
valthuer Funny how "legacy tech" keeps refusing to die. AI didn’t just resurrect HDDs — it needs them. When hyperscalers are drowning in data, cost-per-TB and long-term retention still beat bragging rights. SSDs are fast, GPUs are flashy, but spinning rust is quietly holding the AI boom together. Turns out the future of computing still sounds like whirr . Reply
araghur12 Thank God AI doesn't eat bread, or we would all be left to starve. Reply
flowingbass Im not gonna be surprised if the next price gouge will be fans and heatsinks. "AI hAs GiGaNtIc CoOliNg NeEds hurr durr doiii duhhh" Reply
alan.campbell99 I remember being glad when I moved away from the spinning rust and was able to go all SSD in the desktop PC. I think the server I have has 4 of the 8 SAS drives there that are still HDDs, NAS has 2 HDDs too. Hopefully I won't have to think about storage for a little while at least. RGB is probably safe at least, can't imagine colour bling is on the BOM for all these data centers. Reply
Key considerations
- Investor positioning can change fast
- Volatility remains possible near catalysts
- Macro rates and liquidity can dominate flows
Reference reading
- https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/hdds/SPONSORED_LINK_URL
- https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/hdds/hdd-prices-spike-as-ai-infrastructure-and-chinas-pc-push-collide-hard-drives-record-biggest-price-increase-in-eight-quarters-suppliers-warn-pressure-will-continue#main
- https://www.tomshardware.com
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Informational only. No financial advice. Do your own research.