Seagate
Technology announced today it has greatly expanded its line of
personal computing hard drives, unveiling new internal and external hard
drives with 400GB capacities, a new small footprint portable external hard
drive with up to 100GB capacity and the world’s first pocket external hard
drive. Built on the most advanced hard drive technology platforms in the
industry, each new hard drive is designed to make data storage, backup and
transfer more reliable and easier than ever to meet a variety of consumers’
personal computing needs.
<p. The new Barracuda 7200.8 disc drive offers PC makers and consumers the
industry's highest areal density with 400GB on a three-disc platform, a new
cache size up to 16 Mbytes, a choice of an Ultra ATA interface or the
industry's first native Serial ATA (SATA) interface with native command
queuing (NCQ), and remains the quietest PC hard drive on the market. Seagate
will also offer the new 400GB capacity in its award-winning desktop Seagate
External Hard Drive, which is perfect for using less desktop space and travels
well with notebook PCs while still offering a 100GB capacity. The new Seagate
USB2 Pocket Hard Drive is the first tiny USB-compatible 5GB drive consumers
can pop in their pocket or backpack to carry data wherever they go, thanks to
its tough-but-cute hard case.
<p. "With the variety of applications served by its new product line, Seagate,
the hard drive category leader, is unveiling an unparalleled combination of
capacities, sizes, functions and usability, with among the most advanced
specifications on the market. The announcement of these products puts Seagate
at the forefront of rapidly evolving consumer storage trends," said John Kim,
vice president of TrendFOCUS, a Los Altos, California-based market
intelligence firm.
“With the industry’s highest available capacities, the new Barracuda
7200.8 disc drive enables PC makers and System Integrators to qualify one
family of drives from a trusted supplier for a wide range of personal storage
applications,” said Brian Dexheimer, Seagate executive vice president of
Global Sales and Marketing. “Our new line of External Hard Drives in various
sizes and capacities provides the greatest choice to consumers with widely
varied needs. Coming from the world’s most experienced hard drive maker,
Seagate storage will give customers years of reliable service and top
performance.”
Barracuda 7200.8
Barracuda 7200.8 disc drives, the newest generation of the world’s most
popular PC hard drive family, provide up to 400GB and fast performance with
new cache sizes up to 16-Mbytes, a 7,200-rpm spin speed, and an 8.0-msec
average seek time. It offers the industry’s first Native SATA interface with
NCQ and support for the latest PC technology, including Intel Hyper-Threading.
Barracuda 7200.8 enables fast data-transfer rates for hot-rod PC gaming
systems and mainstream PCs, PC-based home media servers and entry-level SATA
servers. With Seagate’s patented SoftSonic fluid dynamic bearing motors,
Barracuda 7200.8 is extremely quiet, emitting as little as 2.0 bels at idle in
the 120GB version.
SATA NCQ interface technology will provide a new advantage in today’s
systems with Hyper-Threading Technology, which allows multiple applications to
send I/O requests at the same time. NCQ will boost performance still more when
applications take advantage of Asynchronous I/O. In addition, NCQ increases
drive reliability in heavy workloads by eliminating much of the mechanical
wear and tear that a non-NCQ drive must endure to transfer the same amount of
data.
Seagate USB2 Pocket Hard Drive
The Seagate USB2 Pocket Hard Drive is the world’s first external hard
drive small enough for consumers to fit in their pockets or throw in a
backpack. Safely encased in its sleek round shell, its robust design and high
shock tolerance enables mobility and makes it as convenient as a USB thumb
drive, while offering an incredible 2.5GB or 5GB of storage for transporting
or temporarily backing up a huge amount of data.
Seagate Portable External Hard Drive
Designed with a smaller hard drive inside (2.5-inch) to offer up to 100GB
of portable storage in a sleek and very small footprint for your desk, the
Seagate Portable External Hard Drive is the smallest desktop external hard
drive offered by any of the leading hard disc drive suppliers. This high-
capacity, USB bus-powered portable external drive offers low power
consumption, high shock tolerance and a compact footprint — it’s the ultimate
solution for consumers and business travelers who want to take their digital
content with them.
Seagate External Hard Drive
Seagate will also offer its popular Seagate External Hard Drive with a new
400GB capacity. With stunning good looks, cool-running ruggedness, easy push-
button backup, award-winning, easy-to-use backup software and a convenient
on/off switch for power savings and data security, the Seagate External Hard
Drive was developed from the ground up to deliver the highest consumer design
standards ever seen in a hard drive. With Seagate’s unique interlocking
design, users can stack multiple Seagate External Hard Drives horizontally, or
place the drive vertically for the smallest footprint on the market. A sturdy,
upright stand and non-slip rubber feet on two sides ensure the drive can be
arranged in many convenient ways and won’t slide around or slip off a desk.
And users can plug and unplug the drive without turning off the computer. The
Seagate External Hard Drive runs much cooler than other high-capacity external
drives, because it’s designed to dissipate heat in any configuration —
vertical or stacked. Plus, lifetime tech support means that users can call for
friendly technical advice for the entire long life of the drive.
For details about each new Seagate product, please visit
http://specials.seagate.com/spectrum . The Seagate USB2 Pocket Hard Drive and
the Seagate Portable External Hard Drive are expected to be on store shelves
in time for school this Fall 2004. The new 400GB Seagate External Hard Drive
will be on store shelves for the holiday shopping season, and the Seagate
Barracuda 7200.8 disc drive will begin shipping in Fall 2004.
