Hitachi GST Shifts to Perpendicular Recording

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http://techon.nikkeibp.co.jp/english...050406/103471/

Hitachi Global Storage Technologies, Inc. (HGST) of the US announced its project to develop hard disc drive (HDD) products based on perpendicular recording from the second half of 2005. "The growth in HDD capacity has recently been slowing down to an annual rate of 20%," HGST said. "We believe that HGST must shift to perpendicular recording now, or it cannot continue to meet customers' requirements of larger capacity." HGST is the second company that has announced the commercialization of perpendicular recording HDDs, next to Toshiba Corp., which is planning to start volume production in the second quarter (April-June) of 2005. The company made this announcement at a technology presentation for the press on April 5, 2005. HGST will start applying perpendicular recording from a 2.5-inch HDD. The company has not disclosed the product specifications yet, but aims to boost the capacity to 30GB per side of a disc to achieve a total of about 120GB per HDD. This represents a recording density of more than 100Gb/inch2. HGST has already confirmed technology that could boost the density to 230Gb/inch2. The company is planning to release an HDD product at this density in around 2007. If the company applied the 230Gb/inch2. density for a 1-inch product, the capacity of an HDD would reach 20GB. The capacity would be 1TB with a 3.5-inch HDD. Although the company is yet to determine the marketing schedule, perpendicular recording is likely to be implemented in its 1-inch, 1.8-inch and 3.5-inch HDDs in succession.

US Hitachi GST's 2.5-inch perpendicular recording HDD