An encrypyted drive is likely to have (close to) equal numbers of 0's and 1's fu... | Hacker News

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		nritchie 39 days ago \| parent \| context \| favorite \| on: Data has weight but only on SSDs An encrypyted drive is likely to have (close to) equal numbers of 0's and 1's full or empty so any of these arguments are moot.

theandrewbailey 39 days ago [–]

If the drive isn't encrypted, is it possible that controllers use some kind of encoding to balance out the number of bits, so that there's not a long run of 0s or 1s?

userbinator 39 days ago | [–]

Yes, this is necessary for high density NAND flash and is referred to as "whitening" or "scrambling". Not needed at all for SLC or older MLC.

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