Toshiba has announced the commercialization of two new 1.8″ harddrives, the MK1626GCB and the MK8022GAA. Both are designed for mobile devices (the new iPod Classic?) and are shipping already. Thanks to a new, enhanced magnetic layer and an improved read-write head Toshiba has been able to achieve an areal density of 228 gigabits per square inches. The increased capacity is not the only thing that has been improved, but the power consumption has been reduced by 33%, compared to the previous generation.
The drives have rotational speeds of 3600 rpm, average seek time of 15 ms, and weigh 59 g and 48 g respectively (160 GB, 80 GB). The 160 GB model is slightly larger than the 80 GB model, 54.0 x 71.0 x 8.0 vs 54.0 x 71.0 x 5.0 mm, but also has a slightly (s)lower interface speed, 52 MB/s vs. 66 MB/s, as it uses the CE-ATA interface, while the 80 GB model uses the PATA interface.
The main reason the 160 GB model is physically larger is that it uses two platter and four read-write heads, while the 80GB model comes with only one platter and two read-write heads. Still, Toshiba managed to keep the power consumption lower with the 160 GB model, 0.002W/GB, than the 80 GB model, 0.004W/GB.
Toshiba emphasizes the unchallenged price/storage capacity of mechanical harddrives, which is certainly not surprising considering the on-march of flash and solid state drives. We’re glad to see that Toshiba is still trying to keep mechanical drives an option to flash storage in portable devices.
