drive

Like Tony Blair, the hard drive industry is looking at a third way.

To more densely record data on hard drives, that is. Disk track recording involves storing data in tracks laid down in a precise pattern on a platter, according to an article by Rick Merritt of EE Times. It's similar to patterned media hard drives, but could get to market earlier. Disk track recording could show up in drives in two years or so. Patterned media hard drives may not show up until 2012 or later.

"It's probably not a factor of two better than … Read more

Last week, in an article about optimizing hard drives, I mentioned that I'm a digital pack rat. I'm continually bumping up against my disk size and burning files off to DVD.

While maintaining my hard drive is no big problem, finding the files I need among 120GB of images, songs, movies, Web pages, Word docs, and other personal data can be a challenge, especially when I need something ASAP.… Read more

Seagate announced on Monday two hard drives that break the 1-terabyte barrier, the Barracuda 7200.11 and Barracuda ES.2, while Iomega announced two external drive models.

Seagate's ES.2 is geared for high-capacity storage systems and includes technology called Rotational Vibration Feed Forward designed to maintain performance despite the disruptions of other nearby drives. It can use both the Serial Attached SCIS (SAS) and Serial ATA (SATA) interfaces. And its PowerTrim feature reduces power consumption 20 percent overall compared to the company's previous 750GB drives, Seagate said.

The Barracuda 7200.11, like the ES.2, stores data … Read more

Yeah, we know--we're sick of USB drives too. But just when we were about to impose a moratorium on them, along comes Art Lebedev Studio with one that we can't resist.

It figures that the exception would come from the celebrated Russian design house, whose avant-garde Optimus keyboards--the "Maximus" and the still-unpronounceable "Upravlator"--have been among the most lusted-after products in the gadget world for some time. Unlike those groundbreaking products, however, Engadget notes that the "Finger Folder" flash drive is notable for its whimsical simplicity.

It also solves a personal problem … Read more

Back in the old days, there was one size for hard drives, and maybe the device spun a little faster or had a bit more capacity than its competition. But this week, Samsung and Seagate illustrated how variegated the industry has become.

On Tuesday, Samsung announced three new hard drives: a 1.8-inch, 120GB model, a 3.5-inch 1-terabyte drive and a 2.5-inch, 120GB "hybrid" drive that includes flash memory as well as the traditional spinning platters. And on Monday, Seagate announced a rugged 80GB model that's geared for harsh environments.

Samsung's new F1 Series … Read more

I doubt it will replace the CD anytime soon, but some record labels are experimenting with distributing music on portable USB flash drives. The latest in this occasional trend is The White Stripes, whose Icky Thump album is available in both traditional CD form as well as in a limited edition USB thumb drive format.

Now, the flash drive version sells for $57, well more than the $15 price tag of the CD. That means that only die-hard fans will likely buy the drive versions, which depict the band's Jack White and Meg White as Russian dolls. (Those who … Read more

Patterned media and heat assisted. Those are fightin' words in the hard drive industry.

Patterned media technology, actively promoted by Hitachi Global Storage Technologies, stores data in tiny bits laid down in a platter in an intricate pattern. The bits are separated by each other to prevent data corruption. By contrast, in heat assist drives, championed by Seagate Technologies, a bit gets heated to a few hundred degrees Celsius, gets imprinted with data, and then cools down. (We wrote an early story on the debate here.)

Both technologies will allow hard drives to store more data than they do now, … Read more

It's hard to believe, but there was actually a time when gold USB drives were a rare commodity. Now, it seems like a rare week when we don't see one. But that, of course, won't stop us from rolling another one out.

And how can we resist, given the bargains that are to be had these days? The latest model from Israel's E-Jewel, for example, is a 14k specimen that holds 4GB of data for a mere $2,000, according to Coolest-Gadgets. That's a third less than the $3,500 key we cited only a … Read more

It's always nice to see some individualism expressed in technology, especially when it's bucking a trend. A lot of macho USB storage keys, for example, tout their toughness in surviving everything from nuclear blasts to being run over by a car. But this 1GB porcelain USB drive takes the opposite approach as it "turns the traditional notion of a memory stick on its head and offers a hand crafted, beautifully glazed piece of technology in a non-tech body," according to Charles & Marie. It even comes in its own dainty little hand-knit pouch, as Uber-Review notes.… Read more