Best energy saver: Hard disk? SSD?

[qeldroma]

Hi together,

does anybody know a good article on this?

I want to figure out, which way to store data will have the smallest footprint on my akku and i am very unsure. Only interest is energy, speed is not my concern.

Thoughts:
* Disks spin down and need low energy then
* SSD's always need some energy to "fresh up"
* Disks have mechanical parts that need lots of energy IF used

Is it possible, that a good actual harddisk in an office usage scenario can have less consumption than an ssd?
Remarkably?

Does anyone have a profound article or similar about that examination task?

Best regards
Florian

[mikemex]

SSD but must be a new model such as the Samsung 840 Pro. Older SSDs consume MORE power than mechanical drives.

[Cigarguy]

An external HDD that is NOT plugged in to anything will consume nothing. Plug it in only when needed. Getting the "green" 5400 rpm drives will also help. I have two Hitachi external HDD that goes to sleep after 5 min and stays asleep until I call for it.

[Fixed_Rider]

+1 for the 840 series. I think I saw the SSD comparison on Tom's Hardware. I do not recall the exact numbers but the 840 had a fraction of the power draw that the others had.
I currently run an intel 330 series and there is zero seat of the pants difference in battery life over my old WD 640gb.