Which is why flash remains much more expensive than HDDs.
Flash is also much faster than a bubble memory, because it provides random access to blocks, even if a block is read sequentially. Thus flash was positioned in a good spot in a hierarchy of memories where a compromise is made between access speed and cost per bit.
To achieve a similar speed, a bubble memory would have to store a block, e.g. 4 kB, per bubble ring and have a huge number of bubble rings (i.e. billions, to compete with the current flash memories) to which random access would have to be provided by semiconductor ICs handling the multiplexing and demultiplexing of data.
Due to mixing ferromagnetic and semiconductor technologies, it is very unlikely that such a device could be made at an acceptable price.
Flash only got competitive after both HDDs and DRAM scaling slowed, allowing it to catch up, and end up in an interesting position between them.
There are about a dozen upcoming memory technologies with better theoretical headroom waiting in the wings for DRAM and Flash scaling to slow down. In the early 10's it really looked like Flash was about to be replaced, but then Samsung managed to move Flash to the third dimension. Very soon, either DRAM does the same, or it gets replaced by something.
Which is why flash remains much more expensive than HDDs.
Flash is also much faster than a bubble memory, because it provides random access to blocks, even if a block is read sequentially. Thus flash was positioned in a good spot in a hierarchy of memories where a compromise is made between access speed and cost per bit.
To achieve a similar speed, a bubble memory would have to store a block, e.g. 4 kB, per bubble ring and have a huge number of bubble rings (i.e. billions, to compete with the current flash memories) to which random access would have to be provided by semiconductor ICs handling the multiplexing and demultiplexing of data.
Due to mixing ferromagnetic and semiconductor technologies, it is very unlikely that such a device could be made at an acceptable price.
Flash only got competitive after both HDDs and DRAM scaling slowed, allowing it to catch up, and end up in an interesting position between them.
There are about a dozen upcoming memory technologies with better theoretical headroom waiting in the wings for DRAM and Flash scaling to slow down. In the early 10's it really looked like Flash was about to be replaced, but then Samsung managed to move Flash to the third dimension. Very soon, either DRAM does the same, or it gets replaced by something.