Big Jump For Tablet Storage: Seagate Intros 5mm Hard Disk For Tablets

cold fjord writes "ZDNet reports, 'Seagate on Monday took the wraps off a hard drive designed for tablets that brings 7x the storage capacity of a 64GB device with the same performance as a Flash drive. The drive, the Seagate Ultra Mobile HDD, uses software to boost performance. The idea is that Android tablet manufacturers will use the Seagate drive, along with the company's mobile enablement kit and caching software, to up the storage. The 2.5-inch drive is 5 mm thin and weighs 3.3 ounces. As for capacity, the drive has 500GB---enough for 100,000 photos and 125,000 songs.' More at The Wall Street Journal."

Comments

no thanks

[Anonymous Coward]

no thanks. I'm more interested in moveing devices from mechanical to solid state, not the other way around.

Re:no thanks

[ackthpt]

no thanks. I'm more interested in moveing devices from mechanical to solid state, not the other way around.

Absolutely.

My old iPod I treat with utmost care because the little booger has a spinning disc in it. I've seen enough head crashes in my day I don't want one in something without a Field Service Tech a phone call away to handle. Also, I'm rather clumsy with some of my more delicate electronics (hence ordering an Otterbox Defender for my mobile phone) and have been known to damage things with shock.

Why not an SSD at this stage?!? Sure, it's a few extra bucks, but I wouldn't consider anything mechanical storage memory except in a RAID config in a static system.

Re:no thanks

[SoCalChris]

At that point in time, the iPod had around 10 GB of storage, which may not sound like a lot, but a lot of other MP3 players at the time had something like 64 MB of storage.

Less space than a Nomad.

Re:no thanks

[jones_supa]

Wonder how well the drive can take constant shocks and jostling that tablets are subject to. I may not be a HDD expert, but I wonder if just the tapping on a screen might be enough to cause a head crash, especially on a higher RPM drive.

There is no way that tapping the screen would cause a head crash with any hard drive. Disks inside laptops would be dead too soon if that was the case. However if you drop the tablet on a floor, we can start talking about whether this kind of drive would be damaged. Obviously, flash memory will be better in that kind of situation. Of course there are other components to take into consideration too, such as the screen, which might crack when the tablet is dropped.

Re:no thanks

[plover]

why would anyone let aged technologies play an important role in new devices?

Cost and capabilities. Spinny disks will be a lot cheaper, and hold a lot more data. If that's what you need, and aren't as concerned about shocks, durability, longevity, or access speed, then 'yay disks'.

Places where these might come in useful: Low end larger-screen digital media players. Kiosks (think of the tap-your-phone-number-at-checkout loyalty programs.) Smaller shelf signs and advertising in stores, where unit cost is the limiting factor.

Don't get too hung up in the idea that "tablet" means the same thing to everyone. It doesn't have to mean "usage model". Sometimes it can just mean "useful shape".

Re:no thanks

[ArcadeMan]

About 8 billion dollars worth of stolen material, if we're to believe the lies of RIAA accountants.

Re:no thanks

[jaseuk]

No, they were 5mm thin. It was an Apple product.

Jason.

Too bad tablets aren't modular

[timeOday]

With PCs, a piece of hardware could start of as an add-on for enthusiasts, then be integrated by an OEM if it was gaining traction. (Accelerated 3d graphics, for example, caught on this way). But tablets and cellphones are so monolithic that end-user swapping of storage is practically impossible.

The hell is 7x a 64gb drive?

[solafide]

Couldn't we just say 500gb up front and be done with it, instead of having a bogus multiplier on a meaningless size? What's next, "this hard drive holds 30 Library of Congresses, which are each 6x the capacity of a regular library?"

Re:The hell is 7x a 64gb drive?

[dpidcoe]

obligatory XKCD: http://xkcd.com/1257/

SSD or GTFO

[babtras]

I'm not keen to have spinning parts in a device that I drop a couple times a day.

Re:SSD or GTFO

[Anonymous Coward]

You drop your tablet a couple times a day? You'd better keep the fuck away from anything I own.

Sounds like a bad idea ...

[gstoddart]

These things better be really reliable, because a tablet is going to get used in all sorts of angles, is likely to be jostled around a lot more, and might find itself in a case where the accelerometer of the device is being used to control a game.

SSD has the benefit of not having moving parts ... a tablet or a phone sounds like the last place you'd want a spinning platter to be used.

And 3oz is, what, just shy of a quarter pound? What does the 64GB of flash memory we're comparing this to weigh?

Sounds like trying to turn a tablet into a laptop or something.

Units, much?

[Doofus]

I love the jumble of Imperial and SI units in the summary. Great work!

Re:Moving parts is undesirable for mobility

[afidel]

Flash is NOT shock sensitive, check out this link for proof. Cheap USB sticks with bad sodder jobs or cheap PCB's might be subject to shock but the flash itself is most certainly NOT.

5mm? ARTICLE HEADLINE?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, folks, but these editors need to be keelhauled, boiled in oil, or tarred and feathered. When I see "5mm hard disk" in a headline that has no summary on the front page, I think that this is a micro-sized HDD that is 5mm wide. That would be an incredible jump in density! In fact, this is a STANDARD 2.5in sized HDD that is only 5mm thick. They have been making HDDs roughly this size FOR YEARS.

Occasionally, I come back here to read some "news," and I am quickly refreshed on why this site has sunken into the abyss.