The Four-eyed Journal » Storage

512GB SSD from Toshiba

jhay — Sun, 21 Dec 2008 02:23:03 +0000

Netbook lovers would rejoice about this news. The Inquirer.net reports an announcement from Toshiba that they would soon be releasing solid-state drives with a capacity of 512GB, an industry-first according to experts.

The company’s NAND flash SSD series built using 43nm technology will also include 64GB, 128GB and 256GB capacity devices that will be available as both SSD Flash Modules and 1.8-inch and 2.5-inch drive enclosures.

Toshiba says its second generation MLC SSDs have an advanced controller that achieves higher read/write speeds, faster parallel data transfers and better wear leveling than first generation SSDs to optimise performance, reliability and endurance.

It claims its latest drives offer maximum sequential read speed of 240MBps and maximum sequential write speed of 200MBps to enable faster system booting and application loading times. The drives also support AES data encryption to prevent unauthorised data access.

512GB of storage for your netbook, that would be suweet! However, netbook lovers would have to wait for a little while because Toshiba will make the new SSDs available in 2009.

Question now is, how much would these drives cost? More so, what response would be coming from chip-maker Intel about this new high-capacity SSD?

1.5TB HDD for Desktop and 500GB for Notebooks from Seagate

jhay — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 04:31:42 +0000

For weeks now, I’ve been pondering and doing some window-shopping for a decent storage setup that will serve as a backup and archive for my small home network – my laptop and the old desktop.

Last July 10, an announcement from Seagate has become a new factor in my plans:

The debut of the Barracuda® 7200.11 1.5TB hard drive, the eleventh generation of Seagate’s flagship drive for desktop PCs, marks the single largest capacity hard drive jump in the more than half-century history of hard drives – a half-terabyte increase from the previous highest capacity of 1TB, thanks to the capacity-boosting power of perpendicular magnetic recording (PMR) technology.

The Barracuda 7200.11 hard drive combines proven PMR technology, components and expert manufacturing to provide 1.5TB of reliable storage for mainstream desktop computers, workstations, desktop RAID, gaming and high-end PCs, and USB/FireWire/eSATA external storage.

Seagate’s new 2.5-inch half-terabyte 5400- and 7200-rpm drives – Momentus® 5400.6 and Momentus 7200.4 – deliver the best combination of capacity, mobility and durability for mainstream and high-performance notebook computers, external storage solutions, PCs and industrial applications requiring small form factor.

1.5TB of hard drive space inside the chassis of your desktop computer! This is perfect now that more and more movies and videos are released in HD format and with HD screens becoming more available.

That’s for the desktop, now imagine 500GB of space in your laptop, talk about mobility and packing a universe in your notebook right? I know I won’t be able to immediately afford these new drives from Seagate once they are made available locally, but this will surely affect the prices of lower-capacity drives and that is definitely good news for techies on a tight budget like me.

Perhaps come the end of 2008 or early 2009, these monster-capacity drives will be much more affordable for the likes of me but until then it’s a good thing to know that consumer hard drives have finally reached the terabyte era.

PS. I wonder how long it would take to reformat and defrag such drives once they are used? Oh boy!

Poll of the Week: Which backup medium do you use?

jhay — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 00:13:20 +0000

I’d be amazed if you would answer “floppy disks” to this question. LOL Seriously. It’s not to offend but I’d find that very interesting and nostalgic – in a geeky sense.

Anyways, this blog may not have thousands of daily readers but for those who would visit, stumble upon or discover this blog by any chance (via feed readers, email subscription, search results for Naruto p0rn etc), please take some time in adding your answers to this week’s poll question:

“Which backup medium/s do you use?”

[poll=6]

There are 4 choices, which are the general categories of how backup mediums can be classified.

CD/DVD-RW – for now I lumped all optical media storage types in one category.

Secondary internal hard disk – if you’re not going to dual-boot might as well use it as backup storage right?

External hard drive – for those who have the money or the know-how to transform a spare HD into an external storage solution.

On-line storage service – this could also be a hack like GDrive, but nowadays these online storage services are becoming popular.

You can vote for all of the mediums that you use. If you also would like to share your reasons, stories, tips and tricks or experiences with any or all of the storage mediums in the comments thread below. I’m sure it would be a worth-while read for everyone else. The poll closes this Sunday midnight, March 2. Then I’ll compile the comments and stories, analyze what data will be gathered and present a nifty post next Monday. I hope all of you would join in. ^^

Intel’s solid-state drives could boost Asus eeePC

jhay — Sat, 15 Dec 2007 23:53:54 +0000

News from PC World that the world’s biggest chip maker, Intel is readying its solid-state storage drives and will be embedding the said chips on its upcoming platforms for ultra-mobile PCs.

The Z-P140 PATA solid-state storage drives (SSDs) will be provided as an optional module to OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) to embed on motherboards made for the Menlow platform. The platform, designed for ultramobile PCs, also includes the Silverthorne processor and Poulsbo chipset. Menlow-based devices will ship in the first half of 2008, product line manager Don Larson said Friday at an event in San Francisco.

The tiny SSD chip, which weighs only 0.6 grams, will be available in capacities of 2G bytes and 4G bytes. The on-board storage capacity will be expandable up to 16G bytes with four SSDs connected to a standard PATA (parallel advanced technology attachment) interface that links the drives, Larson said. SSDs consume less power than hard drives because they have no moving parts, so they are ideal for mobile devices, Larson said.

One particular ultra-mobile PC that would greatly benefit from this move by Intel is the Asus eeePC, of which I am currently being tempted to get one this Christmas. At present, I hear and read complaints about the eeePCs limited solid-state storage drive, 8GB being the standard spec. Intel’s new chips could very well change all this, and the consumers would benefit the most.

If this could boost the storage capacity of ultramobile PCs, this could also expand the storage capacities of mobile phones. Heck, Nokia just relased new phones from its N-Series that has memory capacities of 8GB so seeing an Intel SSSD chip in one wouldn’t be much of a surprise.

I wonder though, if solid-state storage drives would replace the traditional hard disks in desktops? Imagine that….

Western Digital’s 320GB Portable Hard Disk Drive

jhay — Tue, 04 Dec 2007 15:31:41 +0000

In today’s world of rich media and content being created by the billions every hour, one could never really have enough disk space to store those cherished photos, amazing videos, heart-felt music and much more.

Sure online storage services are becoming popular nowadays but what happens when you lose your internet connection or worse, you don’t have access most of the time. CDs and DVDs offer the cheapest and easiest solution of storing our precious data but once that disc has been closed, it becomes no different from the stone tablets Moses brought down from Mt Sinai.

So still, the best storage solution comes in the form of our trusty old hard disk. Capacity, data integrity and security, reliability are the areas where hard disk drives perform very very well. Hard disk space have doubled even tripled these past few years and the best of all, prices have gone down as well.

With this, portable hard disk drives have become another popular gadget to become part of a geek’s arsenal of technological tools that boost productivity and keep the digital world plump with rich data and content. Just recently, Western Digital launched launched a 320-Gbyte hard disk drive intended for people who need a portable backup device for music, video, and data stored in PC or Apple Mac notebooks or desktops.

This sleek and tiny new device easily slips into any pocket ready at a moment’s notice to serve its purpose. Store your content regardless of its format or file size and make it available to you in a few clicks of the mice.

According to its product page from Western Digital, its key features are:

Easy – Installation is a snap because you don’t really “install” this drive; you just plug it in and it’s ready to use. There is no CD to install; the included software loads from the drive the first time you plug it in.

Smart – Powered by the USB bus. No separate power supply is needed.*

More space – capacities up to 320 GB means you can take even more of your photos, videos, files and music with you wherever you go.

Ultra-portable – This compact drive fits easily in your pocket or purse, weighs only a few ounces and holds tons of valuable data.

Synchronized and secure – WD Sync™ synchronization and encryption software lets you take your critical data with you. Plug WD Passport into any PC, edit files, read e-mail, and view photos. Then sync all of your changes back to your home or office computer. Your data is protected with 128-bit encryption. (Windows only)

Includes Google™ software – Search your drive, manage your photos, and simplify Web searches with included Google software. (Windows only).

Storage with style – Designed with a glossy black case to make a perfect storage style.

Compatible – Use with Windows® and Macintosh® computers

* An optional cable is available for the few computers that limit bus power.

Wouldn’t this new tech toy make a perfect gift this coming Christmas? Of course there’s more technical specs in the product page but still, just this info is enough to make drool over it. I wonder if someone out there would be kind and generous enough to send me one as a gift, this Christmas would be one of the best I ever had.

I just hope the portable hard disk works with Ubuntu.