Here comes the terabyte hard drive

January 5, 2007

Here comes the terabyte hard drive

Michael Kanellos, for News.com

Last year, Hitachi Global Storage Technologies predicted hard-drive
companies would announce 1 terabyte drives by the end of 2006. Hitachi
was only off by a few days.

The company said on Thursday that it will come out with a
3.5-inch-diameter 1 terabyte drive for desktops in the first quarter,
then follow up in the second quarter with 3.5-inch terabyte drives for
digital video recorders, bundled with software called Audio-Visual
Storage Manager for easier retrieval of data, and corporate storage systems.

The Deskstar 7K1000 will cost $399 when it comes out. That comes to
about 40 cents a gigabyte. Hitachi will also come out with a similar
750GB drive. Rival Seagate Technology will come out with a 1 terabyte
drive in the first half of 2007.
The two companies, along with others, will tout their new drives at the
upcoming Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, and will show off
hybrid hard drives, as well.

A terabyte is a trillion bytes, or a million megabytes, or 1,000
gigabytes, as measured by the hard-drive industry. (There are actually
two conventions for calculating megabytes, but this is how the drive
industry counts it.) As a reference, the print collection in the Library
of Congress comes to about 10 terabytes of information, according to the
How Much Information study from U.C. Berkeley. The report also found
that 400,000 terabytes of e-mail get produced per year. About 50,000
trees would be necessary to create enough paper to hold a terabyte of
information, according to the report.

Who needs this sort of storage capacity? You will, eventually, said Doug
Pickford, director of market and product strategy at Hitachi. Demand for
data storage capacity at corporations continues to grow, and it shows no
sign of abating. A single terabyte drive takes up less space than four
250GB drives, which lets IT managers conserve on computing room real
estate. The drive can hold about 330,000 3MB photos or 250,000 MP3s,
according to Hitachi's math.

Consumers, meanwhile, are gobbling up more drive capacity because of
content like video. An hour of standard video takes up about 1GB, while
an hour of high-definition video sucks up 4GB, Pickford said.

Consumers, though, tend to be skeptical of ever needing more storage
capacity.

"We heard that when we brought out 1 gigabyte drives," Pickford said.

The boost in capacity for desktop drives comes in part through the
introduction of perpendicular recording technology to 3.5-inch-diameter
drives. In perpendicular drives, data can be stored in vertical columns,
rather than on a single plane. Drive makers have already released
notebook drives, which sport smaller 2.5-inch-diameter drives, with
perpendicular recording. The 1 terabyte drives will be Hitachi's first
3.5-inch drives with perpendicular recording.

Currently, Hitachi sells 3.5-inch drives that hold 500GB of data, while
Seagate has come out with a 750GB data drive.

Drive makers convert to perpendicular recording when the need for areal
density, the measure of how much data can be crammed into a square inch,
passes 125 gigabits. The terabyte drive (and the 750GB drive) can hold
148 gigabits per square inch, or 148 billion bits. Hitachi's previous
3.5-inch drives maxed out at 115 gigabits per square inch.

The hard drive turned 50 last year, and over the past five decades data
capacity has increased at a fairly regular and rapid pace. The first
drive, which came with the RAMAC computer, weighed about a ton and held
5MB of data.

Hard-drive scientists say that increases in capacity will continue
because of technologies like heat-assisted recording and patterned media.

Information contained in this CNET News.com report may not be
republished or redistributed without the prior written authority of
CNET, Inc. For Permission, contact .
Copyright 2007

how long do you think it will take to format that sucker
"Sparky Spartacus" <> wrote in message
news:bConh.365$...
> January 5, 2007
>
> Here comes the terabyte hard drive
>
> Michael Kanellos, for News.com
>
> Last year, Hitachi Global Storage Technologies predicted hard-drive
> companies would announce 1 terabyte drives by the end of 2006. Hitachi was
> only off by a few days.
>
> The company said on Thursday that it will come out with a
> 3.5-inch-diameter 1 terabyte drive for desktops in the first quarter, then
> follow up in the second quarter with 3.5-inch terabyte drives for digital
> video recorders, bundled with software called Audio-Visual Storage Manager
> for easier retrieval of data, and corporate storage systems.
>
> The Deskstar 7K1000 will cost $399 when it comes out. That comes to about
> 40 cents a gigabyte. Hitachi will also come out with a similar 750GB
> drive. Rival Seagate Technology will come out with a 1 terabyte drive in
> the first half of 2007.
> The two companies, along with others, will tout their new drives at the
> upcoming Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, and will show off hybrid
> hard drives, as well.
>
> A terabyte is a trillion bytes, or a million megabytes, or 1,000
> gigabytes, as measured by the hard-drive industry. (There are actually two
> conventions for calculating megabytes, but this is how the drive industry
> counts it.) As a reference, the print collection in the Library of
> Congress comes to about 10 terabytes of information, according to the How
> Much Information study from U.C. Berkeley. The report also found that
> 400,000 terabytes of e-mail get produced per year. About 50,000 trees
> would be necessary to create enough paper to hold a terabyte of
> information, according to the report.
>
> Who needs this sort of storage capacity? You will, eventually, said Doug
> Pickford, director of market and product strategy at Hitachi. Demand for
> data storage capacity at corporations continues to grow, and it shows no
> sign of abating. A single terabyte drive takes up less space than four
> 250GB drives, which lets IT managers conserve on computing room real
> estate. The drive can hold about 330,000 3MB photos or 250,000 MP3s,
> according to Hitachi's math.
>
> Consumers, meanwhile, are gobbling up more drive capacity because of
> content like video. An hour of standard video takes up about 1GB, while an
> hour of high-definition video sucks up 4GB, Pickford said.
>
> Consumers, though, tend to be skeptical of ever needing more storage
> capacity.
>
> "We heard that when we brought out 1 gigabyte drives," Pickford said.
>
> The boost in capacity for desktop drives comes in part through the
> introduction of perpendicular recording technology to 3.5-inch-diameter
> drives. In perpendicular drives, data can be stored in vertical columns,
> rather than on a single plane. Drive makers have already released notebook
> drives, which sport smaller 2.5-inch-diameter drives, with perpendicular
> recording. The 1 terabyte drives will be Hitachi's first 3.5-inch drives
> with perpendicular recording.
>
> Currently, Hitachi sells 3.5-inch drives that hold 500GB of data, while
> Seagate has come out with a 750GB data drive.
>
> Drive makers convert to perpendicular recording when the need for areal
> density, the measure of how much data can be crammed into a square inch,
> passes 125 gigabits. The terabyte drive (and the 750GB drive) can hold 148
> gigabits per square inch, or 148 billion bits. Hitachi's previous 3.5-inch
> drives maxed out at 115 gigabits per square inch.
>
> The hard drive turned 50 last year, and over the past five decades data
> capacity has increased at a fairly regular and rapid pace. The first
> drive, which came with the RAMAC computer, weighed about a ton and held
> 5MB of data.
>
> Hard-drive scientists say that increases in capacity will continue because
> of technologies like heat-assisted recording and patterned media.
>
> Information contained in this CNET News.com report may not be republished
> or redistributed without the prior written authority of CNET, Inc. For
> Permission, contact .
> Copyright 2007
>

How on earth are we gonna back it up? Give me a 10MB MFM drive and an IBM AT!
.... Ben Myers

On Fri, 05 Jan 2007 04:10:31 -0500, Sparky Spartacus
<> wrote:

>January 5, 2007
>
>Here comes the terabyte hard drive
>
>Michael Kanellos, for News.com
>
>Last year, Hitachi Global Storage Technologies predicted hard-drive
>companies would announce 1 terabyte drives by the end of 2006. Hitachi
>was only off by a few days.
>
>The company said on Thursday that it will come out with a
>3.5-inch-diameter 1 terabyte drive for desktops in the first quarter,
>then follow up in the second quarter with 3.5-inch terabyte drives for
>digital video recorders, bundled with software called Audio-Visual
>Storage Manager for easier retrieval of data, and corporate storage systems.
>
>The Deskstar 7K1000 will cost $399 when it comes out. That comes to
>about 40 cents a gigabyte. Hitachi will also come out with a similar
>750GB drive. Rival Seagate Technology will come out with a 1 terabyte
>drive in the first half of 2007.
>The two companies, along with others, will tout their new drives at the
>upcoming Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, and will show off
>hybrid hard drives, as well.
>
>A terabyte is a trillion bytes, or a million megabytes, or 1,000
>gigabytes, as measured by the hard-drive industry. (There are actually
>two conventions for calculating megabytes, but this is how the drive
>industry counts it.) As a reference, the print collection in the Library
>of Congress comes to about 10 terabytes of information, according to the
>How Much Information study from U.C. Berkeley. The report also found
>that 400,000 terabytes of e-mail get produced per year. About 50,000
>trees would be necessary to create enough paper to hold a terabyte of
>information, according to the report.
>
>Who needs this sort of storage capacity? You will, eventually, said Doug
>Pickford, director of market and product strategy at Hitachi. Demand for
>data storage capacity at corporations continues to grow, and it shows no
>sign of abating. A single terabyte drive takes up less space than four
>250GB drives, which lets IT managers conserve on computing room real
>estate. The drive can hold about 330,000 3MB photos or 250,000 MP3s,
>according to Hitachi's math.
>
>Consumers, meanwhile, are gobbling up more drive capacity because of
>content like video. An hour of standard video takes up about 1GB, while
>an hour of high-definition video sucks up 4GB, Pickford said.
>
>Consumers, though, tend to be skeptical of ever needing more storage
>capacity.
>
>"We heard that when we brought out 1 gigabyte drives," Pickford said.
>
>The boost in capacity for desktop drives comes in part through the
>introduction of perpendicular recording technology to 3.5-inch-diameter
>drives. In perpendicular drives, data can be stored in vertical columns,
>rather than on a single plane. Drive makers have already released
>notebook drives, which sport smaller 2.5-inch-diameter drives, with
>perpendicular recording. The 1 terabyte drives will be Hitachi's first
>3.5-inch drives with perpendicular recording.
>
>Currently, Hitachi sells 3.5-inch drives that hold 500GB of data, while
>Seagate has come out with a 750GB data drive.
>
>Drive makers convert to perpendicular recording when the need for areal
>density, the measure of how much data can be crammed into a square inch,
>passes 125 gigabits. The terabyte drive (and the 750GB drive) can hold
>148 gigabits per square inch, or 148 billion bits. Hitachi's previous
>3.5-inch drives maxed out at 115 gigabits per square inch.
>
>The hard drive turned 50 last year, and over the past five decades data
>capacity has increased at a fairly regular and rapid pace. The first
>drive, which came with the RAMAC computer, weighed about a ton and held
>5MB of data.
>
>Hard-drive scientists say that increases in capacity will continue
>because of technologies like heat-assisted recording and patterned media.
>
>Information contained in this CNET News.com report may not be
>republished or redistributed without the prior written authority of
>CNET, Inc. For Permission, contact .
>Copyright 2007

I just added up the storage on my machines and realized I had passed the 6Tb
barrier.

6Tb.

I think I have a problem.

Tom


"Ben Myers" <> wrote in message
news:...
> How on earth are we gonna back it up? Give me a 10MB MFM drive and an
> IBM AT!
> ... Ben Myers

On Fri, 05 Jan 2007 09:09:23 -0500, Ben Myers
<> wrote:

>How on earth are we gonna back it up? Give me a 10MB MFM drive and an IBM AT!
>... Ben Myers
>


Excellent thread IMO because they're points to consider before buying
these larger hard drives.

I shutter at the thought of losing so many files on this size drive.
Maybe, if it isn't already at that point now, reaching a point where
it becomes practical for "most" users to not exceed a certain size
hard drive even if they need more than one of them. I'm sure others
will have some interesting thoughts about these large hard drives.

I guess another question now comes to my mind... how do you size the
hard drive you need and if upgrade sizes, when? Or do you just do
like me basically, guess and shop at that point (perhaps not the best
way to do this)?

On Fri, 5 Jan 2007 09:16:14 -0500, "Tom Scales" <>
wrote:

>I just added up the storage on my machines and realized I had passed the 6Tb
>barrier.
>
>6Tb.
>
>I think I have a problem.
>
>Tom
>

Maybe only if they crash at the same time???

I haven't bothered to add up all my drives' capacities in a handful of
pc's/laptops in the house but I positive I'm in the 2 tera range
myself.

<RnR> wrote in message news...
> On Fri, 05 Jan 2007 09:09:23 -0500, Ben Myers
> <> wrote:
>
>>How on earth are we gonna back it up? Give me a 10MB MFM drive and an
>>IBM AT!
>>... Ben Myers
>>
>
>
> Excellent thread IMO because they're points to consider before buying
> these larger hard drives.
>
> I shutter at the thought of losing so many files on this size drive.
> Maybe, if it isn't already at that point now, reaching a point where
> it becomes practical for "most" users to not exceed a certain size
> hard drive even if they need more than one of them. I'm sure others
> will have some interesting thoughts about these large hard drives.
>
> I guess another question now comes to my mind... how do you size the
> hard drive you need and if upgrade sizes, when? Or do you just do
> like me basically, guess and shop at that point (perhaps not the best
> way to do this)?

In my case, I use my PCs as my Tivo. I have four sets in the house, each
driven by a PC. It is a complicated setup, using two recording servers and
one media server. The vast majority is HD content, so it is 8Gb an hour.
Even compressing it, it comes out pretty big. I've recorded a pretty huge
library of movies off HBO, etc., for my daughters. That's all SD, but a
movie is still almost 2gb.

The advantage of all this is, if the whole thing crashes, who cares? So I
miss an episode of Grey's Anatomy. I'll catch it in reruns.

I'm rearranging, but my Dimension 8400 will have four 750Gb drives. Should
be enough for a little content.

BigJim wrote:
> how long do you think it will take to format that sucker

That's what "quick format" is all about. A couple minutes, perhaps.

wrote:
> BigJim wrote:
>> how long do you think it will take to format that sucker
>
> That's what "quick format" is all about. A couple minutes, perhaps.

A Quick format doesn't scan the disk for bad sectors.

I think I'd take the time to do a complete format.

Notan

Notan wrote:
> wrote:
> > BigJim wrote:
> >> how long do you think it will take to format that sucker
> >
> > That's what "quick format" is all about. A couple minutes, perhaps.
>
> A Quick format doesn't scan the disk for bad sectors.

Not a major concern with a new drive... it comes in to play later,
though,
>
> I think I'd take the time to do a complete format.

THAT would take hours.

>
> Notan