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IBM 1GB Microdrive Review
A reader writes "MP3 Newswire has run a very good review on the 1GB version of IBM's Microdrive. One major improvement the higher-capacity Microdrive has over the older 340MB drive is that it consumes less power (the older drives sucked up the juice). The article covers the normal ins and outs of the product, but also touches on the future. Because flash cards and other competing storage media this small havent reached the 1GB plateau (yet) these drives are good enough to steal a large slice of the MP3 player/PDA/Digital Camera pie by simply slashing prices to allow, say, a tiny 1GB MP3 portable for under $250. "
Indeed, here's a IBM press release dated June 20, 2000.
Why is it so impossible for supposed "technology writers" to get simple things like GB and MB straight? I mean, it's obvious what was meant, but c'mon! How can that slip past both the writer AND the editor? It's almost as bad as Slashdot, for chrissakes...
I've got a bad attitude and karma to burn. Go ahead. Mod me down.
good enough to steal a large slice of the MP3 player/PDA/Digital Camera pie by simply slashing prices to allow, say, a tiny 1GB MP3 portable for under $250
You did see the headline off of ibm's microdrive site, didn't you? The MP3 player they show has 3 versions:
player + 340 MB Microdrive sells for $299
player + 512 MB Microdrive sells for $349
player + 1000 MB Microdrive sells for $399, the same price as the Apple ipod with a 5000 MB drive.
Still aways away from $250, but getting close.
The biggest surprise is the formfactor of this player. This thing based on the microdrive is BIGGER than the ipod, which is based on a pcmcia-sized form factor 5GB drive! What's the point of a small drive if you stick it in a big case?
edigital: 4.3" x 2.5" x 0.87", 4.9 ounces
ipod: 4.02" x 2.43" x 0.78", 6.5 ounces
The ipod is about an ounce and a half heavier, but holds 5x the data, and has firewire instead of USB. The edigital features voice recognition, but also wastes space with the traditional screen and buttons. Battery life is comparable - 10 hours for the ipod, 12 for the edigital.
HIV Crosses Species Barrier... into Muppets
This is already possible with iPAQ but the battery won't last long I guess...
In fact, there're already people that put a DVD in the iPAQ RAM with 20MB, see: http://pocketmatrix.com/howto/newdvd/
wolruf@gmail.com
Because flash cards and other competing storage media this small havent reached the 1GB plateau (yet...)
I stumbled upon an article yesterday which announced a 1GB Flash Memory CF card, but can't find it now. But, a quick
search on google offered me SanDisk announce 1 GB CF Type I that was dated November 5, 2001 and predicted retail availability in Q1 2002 at under $800. Granted, that's a higher price than the IBM MicroDrive, but it also has a much lower power consumption, so battery life would be greatly improved. In addition, the SanDisk offering has no moving parts, so it also has greater shock resistance.
Yeah, on the other hand I remember them being really costly when they came out, like about $1000. Now they are about $300, or free with the right camera. Well the right $2200 camera at least :-)
Predictable, but still important.
However I still haven't seen the promised type I 500M clones. Ah well.
Your roommate should get a CF reader for his PC. I gave a link, but I've seen dozens of them on the market.
Just a bit of logic to add to your ipod story, mind you, it parks the heads when not in use. The iPod has a cache to support 20 minutes of music (at 128kbps I believe).
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ping -f 255.255.255.255 # if only
They list several that are compatible with the iPAQ on their website.
Of course there is the MicroDrive Which comes in the 340MB or 1GB flavors.
The Kingston DataPak Which holds 260MBor 2GB/5GB storage capacity.
and the Toshiba MK2001MPL a 2GB PCMCIA HDD or the 5GB version
Many of these are cheaper per megabyte than the MicroDrive and will give you much more storage for around the same price. They are supposed to work with any desktop Windows OS (98/ME/2K/XP) and Compaq says they will work with the iPAQ as well.
I bought the Toshiba 5GB and hooked it up to my iPAQ so I could play DivX movies with the Pocket DivX Player from ProjectMayo. I also store a whole bunch of MP3s on it and can transfer the card between my computer and iPAQ for easy file transfers.
These little hard drives are great for anyone who wants portable storage that is large capacity and is pretty easy to use.
Warning, annoying obfuscation of details of my employment due to NDA...
As someone who may have done shock tests for a "small" company, I can tell you that is a bit misleading.
The shock rating typically is determined by placing a drive on an apparatus that drops the drive from a height onto a platform with a controlled shock response (how much it gives, the exact spring constant to give you a certain duration of a pulse). This distance IIRC (say for 800G at 2ms pulse width), is approximately 7ft. This pulse is idealized as a sinusoid with a maximum around the target shock (in this example, 800G).
1500G would be more, but not like firing it out of a gun at a brick. 15000m/s/s is a quick change in velocity. But a little mathematics would show that it isn't inconceivable for a quick stop from a relatively low speed.
I'm sure someone doing some karma enterprising could find some links to companies that develop industrial packaging testing equipment.
It truely is amazing how many people quote what they think is Moores Law only to be radically off.
It has to do with TRANSISTERS doubling every 18months. Nothing at all to do with performance, other than as a side effect -- and thats usually a side effect. Sometimes there is no performance boost at all if the transisters are used for compatibility or configurability. Like say Microcode modifications and X86 compatibility layers.
"The observation made in 1965 by Gordon Moore, co-founder of Intel, that the number of transistors per square inch on integrated circuits had doubled every year since the integrated circuit was invented. Moore predicted that this trend would continue for the foreseeable future. In subsequent years, the pace slowed down a bit, but data density has doubled approximately every 18 months, and this is the current definition of Moore's Law, which Moore himself has blessed. Most experts, including Moore himself, expect Moore's Law to hold for at least another two decades."
Rod Taylor
Not all digital cameras that claim to take type-II compactflash can handle microdrives. A microdrive generates more heat than does a CF card, and also sucks more power when it spins up. Caveat emptor when doing this-- my Canon G1, for example, handles a microdrive just fine (though Canon says they don't officially support it), but a friend of mine's G1 doesn't; his is a little older than mine.
If you can do PCMCIA, you can get more space for cheaper than the Compact-flash Microdrive. Toshiba makes 5GB type II PCMCIA hard disks now. So if the idea was to turn your iPaq into an iPod, you'd be better off getting the bigger disk.
To the people talking about 20 GB units and such: Take a look some day at the difference in size between the laptop hard disk in a 20GB mp3 player and a Microdrive, or even the iPod's 5GB PCMCIA disk. The size difference is mind boggling.Sure, it's not for all solutions, but it's pretty darned cool for the solutions it is for.
-JDF
A good warning - the microdrives seem to be a bit flakey.
I also have a G1. My microdrive (I've had the 320MB one for 14 months or so - and the 1GB version was available then as well! What is with this "news" story showing up now??) has given me lots of problems. It works very well sometimes, but often it just produces tons of CF card errors.
An important thing to be aware of is that IBM changed the microdrive around November of 2000. They lowered the RPMs but increased the density. Despite lowering the drive's speed, because of the increased density the actual transfer speed was increased slightly, and the drive consumed a bit less power, ran cooler, and seems to have become less prone to errors. My microdrive is the older version and is likely why I've had problems with it.
When the newer version came out, those lucky enough to receive one (around November 2000, you didn't know which one you would get when you bought it - they carried the same part numbers, same boxes; only the physical appearance and markings on the drive itself differed slightly to the outward eye) reported having no problems. I'd bet your friend has an older microdrive like I do, and you have the newer (still more than a year old) kind.
-JF
Increased capacity is always a good thing in my opinion (160gb on my home box and I still want more). The problem with IBM Microdrives is that they eat batteries faster than your 15-year-old 1st-gen discman. The typical handheld might last a whole day on its charge when using flash memory, but throw in a Microdrive and it will be dead within 2-3 hours.
-Billco, Fnarg.com
I was about to buy one of these beasts until I found they have altitude limitations. Can't remember the exact number but I do recall that many of the hikes I go on here in Colorado were above the limit.
I believe the issue is that a disk head floats on an air cushion. If the air gets to thin it will touch the platter.
One should not theorize before one has data. -Sherlock Holmes-