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. "

Comments

They work well but are pretty fragile

[Phil Wherry]

I've got two of these beasts (as well as one of the older 340M versions) for digital camera use.

In general, they work pretty well. They're a little bit slower than flash memory, and they use more power--but those are really about the only practical differences under normal circumstances.

You can hear the disk spinning (and the head actuator operating) if you listen carefully, but it's by no means loud.

They do demand careful treatment, though. A friend of mine dropped his Microdrive from about waist height onto carpet, and it never worked again.

Re:They work well but are pretty fragile

[stripes]

They do demand careful treatment, though. A friend of mine dropped his Microdrive from about waist height onto carpet, and it never worked again.

On the other hand Bill Biggart (the only PJ to be killed wile covering the towers collapse) had one in his digital camera. It survived, he didn't, nor did the film in either of his film cameras (the backs burst open). So while his ~30 rolls of film taken earlier were good his last surviving pictures were on the 1G microdrive.

There is a picture of the remains of his camera (on a stark white background) on the cover of the current American Photo magazine. It includes some pretty stunning interviews of a half dozen or so pros that were covering the event.

It is pretty amazing to read how they were "operating on automatic", and "could barely see the viewfinder through the tears", and look at the same time at the amazingly well framed photos (like James Nachtwey's shot for Time with the building coming down in the background framed against the top of a church and it's cross on page 20).

A geek should own it just for the machine beat to death on the cover.

A photo geek should own it for the interviews and pictures.

Everyone who reads news papers should own it to see how the people that get their pictures risk their lives sometimes for them.

I can't find the Am Photo cover online, but doing a google search for "Bill Biggart American Photo" does turn up a whole bunch of relevant articles (including a surprisingly good MSNBC one).

Re:They work well but are pretty fragile

[stripes]

Ah, found it, as an added bonus if you read the rest of the thread you get to see me be beaten up for not knowing the difference between a PCB in the camera and one in the lens.

MP3 player -- IPOD is smaller!!

[morcheeba]

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.

What, no 1G Flash?

[ackthpt]

Because flash cards and other competing storage media this small havent reached the 1GB plateau (yet)

I beg to differ and again. I've posted these before, and Pendrive even has Linux drivers, just FYI.

1GB MicroDrive alternative exists

[martyb]

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.

Small expensive things are always bad (Re:Humm...)

[Tsar]

Small expensive things are always bad.

That's exactly how I explained it to my fiancé—she didn't buy it either.

--
Imagine a Beowulf cluster of these! You could fit 80GB into the space of a... oh, never mind.

Re:Shock specifications!

[darkwiz]

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.

Never worked right

[hyrdra]

Keeping with IBM's tradition of success with their DeskStar line (my 75 gig just failed the other day), I have had three microdrives before finally returning it and purchasing a 320 MB CompactFlash card for $120.

The drive never did actually fail, it only refused to do things like spin up, or would lock up when writing to it. It always seemed to not want to work when I needed it most. And this was for use with a digital camera, handheld, and laptop with CF adapter. I can't imagine using the device for lesiure.

The thing that got me so enraged was the drive would look like it was writing to the disk, then when I would get home from shooting pics or after I copied a huge file there would be only a few random pictures or the filesystem would be corrupt -- not even salvagable.

I'm sure it wasn't my digital camera or any of my other hardware because I tried it in several friends cameras and sure enough it was finicky beyond use. Who knows? Maybe I just got a bad lot -- but I've heard from many others, especially on the digital photography web site that while they would love to use the drive, how can they get it to be reliable? I've never had flash media complain or give me any kind of trouble.

I'd also like to comment on battery usage. Without the MD, I would get about 6-8 hours usage from my iPAQ, however using the drive sparinkly and under normal use that figure drops to around 2-3 hours, 4 tops. Using a CF flash card, I can't even notice a difference (although there probably is one). The microdrive is clearly very demanding of power -- it also heats up *quite* nicely till you can barely hold the device (great for this time of year during the cold though).

Don't even ask about digital cameras. Having to deal with a power-sucking CCD is enough, and when you bring the MD into the picture you have a good *two dozen* shots before the dreaded battery warning. And this is on 1800 mAH NiMH batteries. What's the point in being able to store 700 pictures on one media when you constantly have to switch batteries (assuming you have a few pre-charged sets).

The MD is a great technical feat -- there's no doubt about that. But I would questions its everyday use outside the tradeshow and webzine review for both professionals and lesiure use. I head some of the Delkin MDs are better, but I'm still sure there are some problems. With a 2GB version on the horizon for IBM's model, the microdrive will probably get better. But that begs to ask the real question as to if CF flash media will become cheaper $/MB as the demand is higher and the market is more competitive.