Gizmodo: perpendicular

All the New Macbook Pro HDDs Are All Perpendicular

Brian Lam — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 20:07:54 EDT

Bonus: All the new Macbook Pro HDDs, in every size, are now perpendicular drives.

Only a few drives in the custom order builds were perpendicular in the old Macbook Pro. What's that mean? Better data density and performance. Want to know more? Watch this awesome cartoon. – Brian Lam

200 Gigabytes of Perpendicular Love, Samsung Style

www.gizmodo.com — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 11:46:29 EDT

Seems like just yesterday when the world was all excited about OWC's packaging of a 2.5-in. 160GB 7200rpm drive Seagate Momentus drive with perpendicular recording capability. No time to enjoy that view: Samsung just upped the stakes with a 2.5-inch perpendicular-recording drive of its own. Capacity? 200GB. The company says the SpinPoint MP1 with SATA interface is currently only for enterprise customers; you folks at home will have to settle for the SpinPoint M5 Series, with single-disk options ranging from 60GB to 160GB, out in mid April, followed by a dual-disk 250GB config due later on.–Wilson Rothman

SAMSUNG Develops SpinPoint MP1 2.5inch Hard Disk Drives [Samsung]

Seagate Rolls Out Hybrid Drive, Nine More

Charlie White — Wed, 07 Jun 2006 13:21:42 EDT

Seagate announced a boatload of hard drives today, with 10 rolled out in all. The highlight of the wave of announcements was the Momentus 5400 PSD, a 160GB hybrid drive that's set to ship in the first quarter of 2007 and is destined for Microsoft Vista-running notebooks.

The 2.5 inch drive will spin at 5400RPM, and it will be available with your choice of 128MB or 256MB of flash memory on board. That flash chip will have often-accessed data on it, and Seagate says it will reduce boot times by around 20%. Another great benefit is that it will let your notebook's battery last from 5% to 15% longer. Plus, the drive should be more durable because all those moving parts can be parked while the flash memory is accessed.

Other notable intros were an 8GB pocket drive, a 160GB drive with full disk encryption, a 750GB Barracuda ES, a 60GB 1.8-inch perpendicular-recording drive for handhelds, and the LD25.2, a 750GB disk destined for the HDTV media center market. – Charlie White

Seagate to offer hybrid hard drives for Vista notebooks [TG Daily]

Momentus 5400 PSD (.pdf document) [Seagate]

Toshiba 200GB Notebook Drive

Charlie White — Mon, 05 Jun 2006 10:24:28 EDT

Hard disk drives are holding more and more data, and now notebook hard drives aren't going to miss out on all the fun. Toshiba announced its MK2035GSS drive, a 2.5-inch SATA II hard disk for notebooks that crams 200GB into its tightly-packed perpendicularity.

At a slim 9mm thin, it will fit nicely into today's super-thin notebook form factors, but its 4200RPM spinnage won't be tremendously popular with video editors. For the rest of us, its 200GB will be plenty of space to take lots of porn on the road. Toshiba didn't mention its price or when it would be available, but we won't be truly happy until we can get a flash drive at this size, speed and price range. – Charlie White

MK2035GSS, the 200GB 2,5" HDD perpendicular from Toshiba [Akihabara News]

Hitachi Intros "Drive of Steel"

Charlie White — Mon, 15 May 2006 10:40:23 EDT

We're getting a kick out of Hitachi marketers, where last month they announced an HDTV line they called Wooo—no kidding— and now they're touting a perpendicular hard drive they've named the "Drive of Steel." What's so super about it? Hitachi says the 160GB Travelstar 5K160 2.5-inch drive is so perpendicular that it's "super pendicular," whatever that is, and that's no misspelling on our part.

Breathless marketing aside, the technology inside this drive, aimed at the notebook market, is called perpendicular magnetic recording (PMR), and it's able to pack bits more closely together without distortion. Hitachi says its design uses a read head made out of indium, manganese, and chromium alloy which brings a 2x improvement in field reliability. Expect to see Hitachi using the same technology in next-generation 1.8-inch drives in the second half of this year. For now, to be unveiled in a phone booth near you, the Hitachi 5K160 will be on sale this summer for $269.

Hitachi hard drive makes firm go nuts in May [the Inquirer]

Seagate 750GB External Drive

Charlie White — Mon, 01 May 2006 10:28:14 EDT

We told you about the Seagate Barracuda 750GB internal hard disk, and now it looks like the company has dressed up that drive in a techno-fantabulous enclosure, offering it in external trim for a hefty $559.

The 3.5-inch 7200RPM hard drive uses the latest perpendicular recording technology, and can be hooked up via USB 2.0 or FireWire. Look for it in stores this month.

Seagate 750GB Pushbutton external hard drive [Newlaunches]