Six months after showing off the demo, Seagate announced Monday that it is now shipping what it says is the word's first 3.5-inch 6Gbps 2TB hard drive.
The drive is based on the third generation of the Serial ATA (SATA) standard, roughly called SATA3. The majority of existing hard drives use the SATA2 standard that caps at 3Gbps. Theoretically, the new 6Gbps standard's throughput could be fast enough to transfer the entire contents of a CD (about 800MB) in just one second.
The new 6Gbps 2TB Barracuda XT hard drive from Seagate.
(Credit: Seagate)The new hard drive is called Barracuda XT, and it belongs to the company's mainstream line of desktop hard drives. It spins at 7200rpm and boasts 64MB of cache memory, as opposed to the 16MB or 32MB of most existing hard drives. It is a four-platter drive with an areal density of 368 gigabits per square inch.
Of course, to take advance of the new 6Gbps throughput speed, the Barracuda XT needs to be installed in a computer with a 6Gbps SATA controller. The good news is that's also available now.
According to Marvell, a maker of hard drive controllers, the first SATA 6Gbps controller is now incorporated in high-end motherboards from Asus and Gigabyte, such as the Asus P7P55D Premium or the GA-P55-Extreme. There will soon also be expansion cards that add the new controller to existing computers.
However, the new drive is backward-compatible with previous versions of the SATA standard, including the SATA 1.5Gbps and SATA2 (3Gbps). This means you will be able to use it with your current computer at the speed of the current controller. Nonetheless, it's predicted that by the end of next year, the new SATA3 will be the mainstream standard that replaces the existing SATA2.
According to Seagate, the new Barracuda XT hard drive is ideal for high-performance desktops, low-cost servers, and external storage devices.
Together with the Barracuda XT, Seagate is also introducing Seagate SeaTool software, which allows for optimizing the drive configuration and tuning it for performance by sacrificing some capacity. For example, users can use the tool to format the 2TB drive into a 1TB drive that offers much faster performance.
The new Barracuda XT 2TB 6Gbps hard drive is available now and costs $299, which is the same price as other 2TB 3Gbps hard drives currently on the market.
After releasing relatively low-performance 2TB hard drives a few months ago, Western Digital announced Tuesday that it's now shipping high-performance versions of these top-capacity drives.
The WD RE4 drive
(Credit: Western Digital)The new drives are the WD Caviar Black and the WD RE4. According to the company, the former is designed for desktops while the latter is suited for servers and network storage devices.
These two new hard drives are based on WD's 500GB-per-platter technology. They both combine 7200rpm spin speed, 64MB cache, dual-stage actuator technology, SATA 2 (3Gb/s) interface, and an integrated dual processor.
(Dual actuator technology is a head-positioning system with two actuators that improves positional accuracy over the data track. The primary actuator provides coarse displacement using conventional electromagnetic actuator principles. The secondary actuator uses piezoelectric motion to fine tune the head positioning to a higher degree of accuracy.)
Other features of the two drives include:
- IntelliSeek, a technology that calculates optimum seek speeds to lower power consumption, noise, and vibration.
- StableTrac, a mechanism that makes sure the motor shaft is secured at both ends to reduce system-induced vibration and stabilize platters for accurate tracking during read and write operations.
- NoTouch, a ramp-load technology that keeps the recording head from ever touching the disk media to significantly reduce the wear and tear of the recording head and media as well as provide better drive protection in transit.
In addition, the WD RE4 2TB enterprise drive features 1.2 million hours mean time between failures (MTBF) and other power-saving, speed-enhancing, and fail-proofing technologies.
The WD Caviar Black 2TB (model WD2001FASS) drive is available now for $299. The WD RE4 2TB (model WD2003FYYS) drive is currently being qualified by OEMs. Both drives are covered by a five-year, limited warranty.
(Credit:
Apple)
For those of you looking for more capacity in Apple's combo 802.11n router/NAS drive, the company has boosted its top-end Time Capsule to 2TB and slapped a $499 price tag on it.
More significantly, Apple also dropped the price of the 1TB model--which just Wednesday cost $499--to $299. Aside from the higher capacity, nothing else appears to have changed.
Previously, Apple also offered a 500GB Time Capsule, but that model has been discontinued and can only be found in the refurbished aisle, where it's going for $199.
All I can say is that if Apple was able to shave off $200 on the 1TB model, it must have had one hell of a nice margin.
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(Via: Engadget)
On Sale Now: $264.95 - $441.91
View the latest prices for Apple Time Capsule (1TB, Winter 2009)
The FreeAgent Go Pro for Mac external hard drive.
(Credit: Seagate)Mac users have had many options for external storage lately. Two weeks ago, Western Digital unveiled its new My Book Studio II for Mac, and Seagate just now released a few of its own.
The company announced Wednesday a new lineup of portable and desktop FreeAgent external hard drives designed specifically for Macs. This includes two portable external hard drives, a regular-size external hard drive, and a docking station.
... Read moreTo celebrate Earth day, Seagate announced Wednesday the availability of its new, extra-low-power desktop hard drive, the Barracuda LP (LP stands for low power).
(Credit:
Seagate)
If Western Digital's new WD RE4-GP desktop hard drive has no spinning rpm specification, Seagate's Barracuda LP has a rather unconventional spinning speed of 5,900rpm.
Generally, the spinning speed is associated with the performance of hard drives. For example, drives with 5,400rpm tend to have a lower performance than those with 7,200rpm, which is the current spinning speed of most desktop hard drives.
However, the faster the hard drive spins, the more energy it uses. It's almost impossible to increase the power efficiency of a hard drive without changing its spinning speed.
With that said, the new Barracuda LP is more suitable for applications that don't require a high level of performance, but rather stability and power efficiency.
Example of these applications are low-power personal computers, external PC storage and multiple-drive home networking systems, such as NAS servers. And these are exactly the market that Seagate is targeting with its new hard drive.
The company claims that the Barracuda LP helps reduce system power costs, runs more quietly than traditional drives, operates at lower temperatures and, most importantly, uses as much as 25 percent less electricity than competing "green" hard drives.
The new Barracuda LB comes in 3.5-inch form factor and uses SATA standard. It's available in 1TB, 1.5TB, and 2TB version that costs $118, $156, and $358, respectively.
Seagate BlackArmor NAS server next to the Maxtor Central Axis.
(Credit: Dong Ngo/CNET)I got my hands on Seagate's BlackArmor 440 NAS server and it seems different from most NAS servers I've reviewed.
The BlackArmor 440 is one of two products in the BlackArmor NAS server family that Seagate introduced last Tuesday. The other is the BlackArmor 420. The only difference between the two is the 420 ships with only two hard drives preinstalled, leaving two bays empty, while the 440 comes fully populated with four drives. Both devices are aimed at business and home office environments.
These are the first NAS servers that are truly from Seagate. The company does sell and support a few others, such as the Central Axis, but under a different brand.
The BlackArmor NAS server has a rugged and compact look for a four-bay NAS server and comes with an easy-to-use, tool-free design. It can take up to four SATA hard drives of up to 2TB of storage.
Unlike other NAS servers I've seen, the BlackArmor has four USB ports and two Gigabit Ethernet ports. The USB port can host other external USB hard drives that can be set to contain the backup of the NAS server's internal storage. According to Seagate, this allows for offsite backup rotation.
... Read more
That's 2,000GB or 2,000,000MB of flash storage for noobs.
The Memory Sticks don't have an official name yet, and Sony and SanDisk are temporarily calling them collectively "Memory Stick format for Extended High Capacity." Format licensing is expected to begin this year. Once completed, we'll see storage capacities for these flash media (Memory Stick Pro DUO, Memory Stick Pro-HG, Memory Stick Micro, and Memory Stick HG Micro) hit up to 2 terabytes, with maximum data transfer rates of 20MBps (on a 4-bit parallel interface) and 60MBps (on an 8-bit parallel interface) for the HG card formats.
(Credit:
Sony)
Sony is also announcing Friday the availability of 16GB Memory Stick Micro (M2) cards. These will be available in the Asia Pacific region starting next month and are bundled with a USB adapter, though there's also an option to purchase the flash card separately.
According to the Japanese outfit, the 16GB M2 card comes with a five-year warranty and can withstand temperatures from minus 13 degrees Fahrenheit to 185 degrees Fahrenheit. The supplied adapter doesn't support the MagicGate content protection technology, though. We are still checking with Sony Ericsson to find out which phones are compatible with the new 16GB card and will update once we have the information.
(Source: Crave Asia)
Related story:
The new WD ShareSpace NAS server.
(Credit: Western Digital)Western Digital (WD), introduced on Tuesday its all-new NAS server called ShareSpace. The server somewhat resembles the design of the company's My Book external hard drives with easily accessible drive bays, eco-friendly hard drives, and quiet performance.
The new NAS server has four hard-drive bays: each can accommodate a 3.5-inch SATA internal hard drive up to 1TB in capacity, making the server's total storage space up to 4TB. The four hard drives can be installed or removed completely without using a tool and set up in RAID 0, RAID 1, or RAID 5 configurations. The NAS server features Gigabit Ethernet for network connectivity and three USB 2.0 ports for additional external storage or power management with a UPS unit. Unfortunately, these USB ports can't be used for any other USB-related functions such as print-serving or USB cameras.
The ShareSpace offers a good set of features found collectively in other NAS servers including FTP, iTunes servers, HTTP and FTP download capabilities, free Web-access via MioNet, and support for Microsoft Active Directory. The server also comes with backup software licensed to be used with up to three computers. Its front USB port can be used to quickly back up the entire contents of an external hard drive, such as the WD My Passport or any other USB hard drive.
The ShareSpace is equipped with WD's GreenPower hard drives, used also in the My Book series, that are said to use up to 33 percent less energy than other SATA hard drives. There are two versions of the ShareSpace, 2TB and 4TB, that cost $700 and $1,000, respectively, and both come with a three-year warranty.
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