Hitachi has developed a 500GB 7mm thin single-platter hard drive, dubbed the Travelstar Z5K500. The single platter disk drive has a density of 636GBit/inch, and uses the Advanced Form drive specification which increases the sector size on drives from 512 bytes to 4KB. Advanced format drives utilize hard drive surface area better, allowing for higher storage densities and better error correction methods. The Travelstar Z5K500 also features an 8MB cache and a SATA 3Gbit/sec interface.
According to Computerworld, the Travelstar Z5K50 will be available in a variety of flavors; including 500GB, 320GB, and 250GB models and has been designed for use primarly in laptops and other mobile devices.
Brendan Colins, VP of Hitachi marketing spoke of small form factor devices stating, “Ultra thin and light devices are, without argument, a growing trend. In order for these innovative designs to live up to their true potential, they need rugged, reliable high-capacity hard drives that can withstand the rigors of a portable environment and satisfy the storage demands of their end users, and Hitachi continues to deliver.”
The Travelstar Z5K500 also offers the ability for bulk data encryption, allowing all data placed on the drive to be better secured.
As laptops and netbooks continue to strive for smaller, thinner form factors, advances such as these will help ensure a less bulky and streamlined design.
Hatachi has not yet announced pricing for the Travelstar Z series hard drives.