New WD Purple Storage Solutions Geared for AI-Enabled Video Recording

SAN JOSE, Calif. — Western Digital Corp. (NASDAQ: WDC) has expanded its portfolio of WD Purple storage solutions, including the industry’s highest capacity 18TB surveillance HDD for DVRs, NVRs and analytics appliances, and the 1TB WD Purple SC QD101 microSD card for AI-enabled cameras.

All WD Purple drives are optimized to help reduce frame loss and pixelation, improve overall video playback and enhance streaming for 24×7 workloads — from ingest to backup and long-term storage — as the industry broadens the use of deep learning and analytics, according to an announcement.

From commercial buildings to municipalities, businesses are accelerating adoption of AI and deep learning to enable automation and better efficiencies that ultimately help create a safer and better experience for employees, customers and communities. Deep learning algorithms, hungry for data generated by IoT and edge ecosystems, demand higher resolution for better accuracy, increasing the need for storage capacity in cameras and NVRs.

In its recent report, Video Surveillance & Analytics Intelligence Service, July 2020, Omdia states that shipments of cameras enabled with deep learning algorithms will continue growing at a five-year (2019-2024) CAGR of 67%, and NVRs enabled with deep-learning analytics will grow at 37%. Meanwhile, video analytics appliances shipments are expected to grow at 43%.

In addition, a 2020 Western Digital-commissioned survey of North American security system integration companies found that 76% of them see video analytics and AI as playing an ever-increasing role in their deployments.

The product release announcement includes the following product details:

Beyond Hardware

Western Digital’s HDD firmware optimizations and data management capabilities for its WD Purple drives play a critical role in improving system capabilities as well as managing devices across AI-enabled smart video solutions. The combination helps improve performance, reliability, durability and overall better operational efficiency and TCO for customers. Western Digital’s AllFrame technology for WD Purple HDDs delivers extensive caching and streaming management techniques to help prevent data loss and keep up with ongoing stream management. Western Digital Device Analytics, a software-based solution for Western Digital’s HDDs, provides monitoring and drive analysis to users, enabling them to detect problematic conditions on a drive and provides instructions for remediation before an issue occurs.

WD Purple 18TB HDD

Leading the industry in capacity for surveillance drives, the new WD Purple 18TB HDD is designed for NVRs and video analytics appliances as well as GPU-enabled devices that can deliver both real-time and post analytics applications. Offering 28 percent more capacity than the previous generation, the new 18TB drive has room to spare for storing video, reference images and metadata at the edge, to support more effective AI. WD Purple drives from 8TB to 18TB feature AllFrame AI technology that enables recording of up to 64 high-definition cameras, as well as an additional 32 streams for deep learning analytics.

WD Purple SC QD101 1TB microSD Card

This WD Purple 1TB microSD card is designed for AI-enabled cameras, surveillance cameras and edge devices, serving as primary or back-up data storage. It is based on Western Digital’s advanced 96-layer 3D NAND technology, and delivers a combination of ultra-high endurance with up to 500 P/E cycles and comes in 1TB, 512GB, 256GB, 128GB, 64GB and 32GB capacities. Rugged and durable, the WD Purple microSD card is weather resistant, humidity resistant and can withstand temperatures from -25° degrees to 85° degrees C. In compatible cameras, the card health monitor provides installers and integrators with the ability to gauge the remaining endurance and preemptively service the card if needed.

According to the company, the WD Purple 18TB HDD will be available in October, and the WD Purple SC QD101 1TB microSD card is expected to be available in November.