Seagate’s hard drive/battery fanny pack is made for VR

In addition to the major software update for the Vive Focus standalone VR headset yesterday, HTC also unveiled the Seagate VR Power Drive which, as the name suggests, is a hybrid of a power bank and a portable hard drive. This isn't an entirely new i...

HGST’s 1.5TB laptop drive is the densest hard disk available

HGST's laptop drive is the thinnest, densest 15TB drive on the market

If you're looking for pure storage for the dollar, SSDs have nothing on good old hard disks. And WD subsidiary HGST has packed more gigabytes into a smaller space than ever before with the new Travelstar 5K1500. It's a 2.5-inch, 9.5mm thin model packing 1.5TB, giving your notebook a huge shot of extra storage space while taking up very little physical space. The two platter drive boasts 694Gb per square inch and draws a mere 1.8W, though it must spin at a miserly 5,400 RPM. Still, it can absorb 400Gs of shock for 2ms and keep on ticking -- so it should have no trouble surviving reentry. HGST's targeting notebooks, external drives, gaming consoles and AIO PC markets with the model, and will also offer an enhanced availability (EA) version for power sensitive servers and other 24/7 systems. There's no price yet, but it'll be available in June -- so you might be able to take that film editing project on the road after all.

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Apple extends 1TB Seagate HDD replacement program to cover additional iMacs

Apple extends 1TB Seagate HDD replacement program to cover additional iMacs

Last year, faulty 1TB Seagate drives living in 21.5-inch and 27-inch iMacs purchased between May and July of 2011 were at the heart of Apple's HDD replacement program. Now, Cupertino has extended the initiative to encompass rigs sold between October 2009 and July 2011. Customers with an affected iMac are eligible to receive a free drive until April 12, 2013 or for three years after their desktop's original purchase date. Curious if your machine contains an afflicted hard drive? Simply visit the source link below and plug in your computer's serial number to find out. If you do need a replacement, an Apple Store or authorized service center will be happy to help -- just remember to back up your drive before parting with it.

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Apple extends 1TB Seagate HDD replacement program to cover additional iMacs originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 14 Oct 2012 20:28:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Western Digital bumps My Book Thunderbolt Duo to 8TB, consoles regular My Book buyers with 4TB

Western Digital MyBook Thunderbolt Duo at Macworld 2012

Many of us may have liked the prospect of Western Digital's My Book Thunderbolt Duo, but there's no doubt some of us who discovered that even 6TB just wouldn't cut it. If that digital pack rat mentality describes you, the solution is here: the company has taken advantage of larger 4TB hard disks to stuff a total 8TB of storage into the Duo's enclosure. The extra capacity hikes the price to $850, although the company notes that it's including the often expensive Thunderbolt cable to avoid any surprise trips to the store. Those without the ports or budget for the Duo can still reap some of the benefits through an updated, 4TB version of the regular My Book that hums along on USB 3.0 at a more reasonable $250 price. Either of the new drives should be lurking in stores if you're hurting for space as we write this.

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Western Digital bumps My Book Thunderbolt Duo to 8TB, consoles regular My Book buyers with 4TB originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 09 Oct 2012 17:33:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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HGST develops helium-filled, high-capacity hard drives: no, they won’t float away

HGST CinemaStar Z7K500

With certain exceptions, talk of advanced hard drive technology regularly has a tough time escaping research labs. Western Digital's HGST is promising a much more tangible project that could boost data capacities by a wide margin. By filling the gaps between drive platters with less buffeting-prone helium instead of air, HGST can safely fit as many as seven platters in a typical, 3.5-inch desktop hard drive instead of the current five. Going with the lower density gas creates a raft of side benefits, such as fitting more data on a single platter along with reducing the drag that both slows down and heats up the disk. We'll have to wait until 2013 to see shipping helium-filled drives in our PCs; given the slightly exotic nature of the technique, though, we wouldn't count on HGST or Western Digital handing out drives for free like balloons at a birthday party.

Continue reading HGST develops helium-filled, high-capacity hard drives: no, they won't float away

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HGST develops helium-filled, high-capacity hard drives: no, they won't float away originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 14 Sep 2012 08:23:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Western Digital brings wafer thin 5mm hard drives to IDF, we go hands-on (video)

Western Digital brings wafer thin 5mm hard drives to IDF, we go hands-on video

We're a jaded bunch here at Engadget sometimes, and with most of us using SSD-based systems these days it's hard to get too excited about good old spinny disks. Still we're also suckers for impressive technology, so our interest was piqued when Western Digital announced its 5mm thin 2.5-inch hard drives the other day. Luckily, the company saw fit to bring samples of its skinny new WD Black hybrid drive and WD Blue HDD to IDF 2012 and let us handle both briefly. The verdict? These are impossibly thin -- perfect for all those nice Ultrabooks we're expecting to see hit the market in the next few months. Details on performance, availability and pricing are scarce since these drives are intended for OEMs. Take a look at our gallery below, which includes thickness comparisons with WD's upcoming 1TB 7mm thin HDD and a standard-sized loyalty card -- then peek past the break for our hands-on video.

Update: yes, the loyalty card was demagnetized in the making of this video, and you now owe us all coffee.

Continue reading Western Digital brings wafer thin 5mm hard drives to IDF, we go hands-on (video)

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Western Digital brings wafer thin 5mm hard drives to IDF, we go hands-on (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 12 Sep 2012 20:18:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Western Digital builds 5mm-thick hybrid hard drive, Ultrabook makers sign on early

Western Digital builds 5mmthick hybrid hard drive, Ultrabook makers sign on early

Those 7mm-thick hard drives you've seen in some Ultrabooks are already looking a tad on the chunky side. Western Digital has started producing sample versions of a hybrid hard drive (you're not yet looking at it here) that measures just 5mm (0.2in) tall, even as it crams in both flash and a 500GB main disk. If you think the slimmer drive is just the ticket for a best-of-all-worlds laptop that's both fast and capacious, you're not alone: Acer and ASUS have mentioned their collaboration in the same breath, which may be a strong clue as to where future Aspires and Zenbooks are going. The remaining question is when they arrive. Sampling isn't the same as mass production, which could leave us with months to go before the 5mm drive lands in future extra-skinny PCs.

Continue reading Western Digital builds 5mm-thick hybrid hard drive, Ultrabook makers sign on early

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Western Digital builds 5mm-thick hybrid hard drive, Ultrabook makers sign on early originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 10 Sep 2012 14:05:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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ASUS Zenbook Prime faces teardown, affords a little expansion in an even smaller space

ASUS Zenbook Prime faces teardown, affords a little expansion in an even smaller space

We often assume that Ultrabooks scarcely have any room to budge on the inside, and that's usually true. An iFixit teardown of ASUS' Zenbook Prime has proven that there's always an exception to the rule. Looking at a UX32VD with the same base layout as the UX31 we reviewed, the repair outlet finds that the upgraded Zenbook has both embedded and removable RAM: provided owners are still willing to perform some surgery, they can upgrade past the 4GB of included memory on their own terms. The repair team is a bit dismayed that there's a 5,400RPM hard drive spinning near the mini SSD -- how very 2011 -- but notes that it's equally swappable by those who want something faster. Whatever you think of the fully pieced-together ASUS PC, it's apparent there's a reward for those willing to take it apart.

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ASUS Zenbook Prime faces teardown, affords a little expansion in an even smaller space originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 16 Aug 2012 15:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Seagate completes purchase of LaCie in quest to become king of the hard drive hill

Seagate completes purchase of LaCie

The final price may end up being more than the initially proposed $186 million, but Seagate has successfully acquired a controlling share of LaCie stocks. The provisional price of €4.05 per share could increase to €4.17 if Seagate manages to accumulate 95 percent of the company's stocks in the next six months. As of now, however, it hold just shy of 65 percent, enough to take control of the French manufacturer. With LaCie and its valuable consumer business under its belt and Samsung's SSD expertise, the move to reject a Western Digital take over is looking better and better. After all, consumer choice is the engine of capitalism and now Seagate has more than enough ammunition to take on WD and its Hitachi properties. Check out the PR after the break.

Continue reading Seagate completes purchase of LaCie in quest to become king of the hard drive hill

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Seagate completes purchase of LaCie in quest to become king of the hard drive hill originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 03 Aug 2012 23:27:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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France’s ANDRA developing a million-year hard drive, we hope our badly-written blogs live in perpetuity

France's ANDRA developing a millionyear hard drive, we hope our blogs live in perpetuity

Us humans have been quick to embrace digital technology for preserving our memories, but we've forgotten that most of our storage won't last for more than a few decades; when a hard drive loses its magnetism or an optical disc rots, it's useless. French nuclear waste manager ANDRA wants to make sure that at least some information can survive even if humanity itself is gone -- a million or more years, to be exact. By using two fused disk platters made from sapphire with data written in a microscope-readable platinum, the agency hopes to have drives that will keep humming along short of a catastrophe. The current technology wouldn't hold reams of data -- about 80,000 minuscule pages' worth on two platters -- but it could be vital for ANDRA, which wants to warn successive generations (and species) of radioactivity that might last for eons. Even if the institution mostly has that pragmatic purpose in mind, though, it's acutely aware of the archeological role these €25,000 ($30,598) drives could serve once leaders settle on the final languages and below-ground locations at an unspecified point in the considerably nearer future. We're just crossing our fingers that our archived internet rants can survive when the inevitable bloody war wipes out humanity and the apes take over.

[Image credit: SKB]

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France's ANDRA developing a million-year hard drive, we hope our badly-written blogs live in perpetuity originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 15 Jul 2012 13:55:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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