News

posted on 05 March 2008 11:10

Samsung has announced two new 2.5-inch disk drives, a fast 7.2K rpm one and a capacious 500GB one, while simultaneously releasing the news that Lenovo will use a 64GB Samsung flash solid state drive (SSD) as the only storage in its ThinkPad X300 notebook.

2.5-inch drives

The Spinpoint MP2 is a 250GB, 2.5-inch format hard disk drive (HDD) offering 250GB capacity via two 125GB platters. It has a SATA II interface running at 3Gbit/s, has Native Command Queuing, and is quiet and robust with an optional fall sensor. It has a 16MB buffer memory and is offered in capacities ranging from 80 to 250GB.

Andy Higginbotham, director of hard drive sales and marketing, Samsung Semiconductor, reckons its size and speed make it suitable as a desktop notebook replacement drive: “As the capacity, performance, and stability features are comparable with those of 3.5-inch hard drives, Samsung’s 2.5-inch drive offers our customers a smaller form factor with a broad range of speed and density choices for advanced data storage,”

Other possible applications in Samsung's view are entry-level enterprise applications such as workstations and RAID or blade servers. The MP2 will ship in March to Samsung OEMs and no pricing information was released.

The SpinPoint M6 offers 500GB in its its 2.5-inch form factor and, although its has 3 x 167GB platters, still fits inside the standard 9.5mm notebook 2.5-inch form factor height limit. It spins at 5,400rpm. Fujitsu's recently announced 500GB 2.5-inch drive needs a larger enclosure height making it unsuitable for retro-fitting to curent 2.5-inch disk-using notebooks. The Fujitsu drive is also slower, spinning at 4,200rpm.

The MP6  meets Microsoft's fast-boot design requirements and supports ramp load and unload of up to 600,000 times. Like the MP2, it has an 8MB cache, a  SATA II interface, and is ready to ship now, with targeted applications being notebook computers as well as slim form factor PCs and high density mobile applications. Prices start from $299.

Market research firm IDC forecasts that the demand for 2.5-inch hard drives will reach 203 million units in 2008, which is an annual 20 percent increase.

Samsung suggests that notebook suppliers use two of the drives to produce a terabye notebook.

On the flash front
Lenovo will use a 64GB, SATA II, Samsung SSD as the one and only storage drive in its ThinkPad X300 high-end notebook computer. This is a MacBook Air-type design, weighing in at 2.9 pounds, and measuring less than three-quarters of an inch thick, approximately the height of a U.S. 25-cent coin. It will be a full-function PC with a 13-inch widescreen, GPS functionality and enterprise-level security features, as well as a wide range of wireless connectivity options.

Samsung states that the SSD unit reads data at 100 MB/sec writes it at 80 MB/s. It operates two to five times faster than conventional hard disk drives, consumes approximately 30 percent less power, weighs only 73 grams, and can resist up to 1500 Gs of shock in a half millisecond.

Jim Elliott, Samsung Semiconductor's VP for memory marketing, said: "With the Samsung SATA II SSD, Lenovo is delivering the highest performance rates for rugged, ultra-light storage in an ultra-portable notebook."

The firm believes SSD capacity will double every twelve months. That means Lenovo could look forward to 128GB next year and 256GB in 2010.

Samsung is actively developing and extending its flash memory SSD products whilst also developing products for the growing 2.5-inch form factor HDD market. Both product lines will co-exist for a good time yet.