NEWZ: Hitachi Releases Slim Hard Drive with Video Streaming

[GIANT]

Hitachi Global Storage Technologies has introduced a 2.5-inch hard drive with several features that company executives predict will make it a leading contender in several segments of the notebook market, as well as the consumer electronics market...

The 4,200 rpm Hitachi Travelstar 4K120 hard drive uses new technology developed by Hitachi that makes power consumption more efficient. Called Hivert (Hitachi Voltage Efficiency Regulator), the technology improves power efficiency by as much as 30 percent, extending battery life by up to 20 minutes for an average workload and increasing the service life of the drive itself...



http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1833942,00.asp?kc=ewnws070605dtx1k0000599


HITACHI PRESS RELEASE

 

[P5-133XL]

and once again slowing down the RPM's to make it into a slug that no one will want. Preaty soon, I expect the RPM's to be back at the 3600 range like they were in the 80's.

 

[GIANT]

and once again slowing down the RPM's to make it into a slug that no one will want...

With drives of this type, recording density -- ala Perpendicular -- should elevate the sustained read/write transfer rate appreciably, thus re-gaining most of the performance that would be otherwise lost.

Still, seek and access will unavoidably suffer at 4.2k RPM. A monster track cache on the order of 16 MB or 32 MB of ultra-low-voltage RAM would help in this scenario.

 

[P5-133XL]

It was my understanding that the perpendicular recording technology was to be first used at the 160GB level (except for the 1 inch format) and the lower sized drives being introduced at the same time are simply getting the free marketting of guilt by association.