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Hitachi Global Storage Technologies on Jan. 5 unveiled what it says is the industrys first 1TB hard drive.
The Deskstar 7K1000 offers users a high storage capacity that allows them to store their games, home movies, photos and music while also providing them with increased drive protection via a ramp load design that decreases the risk of shock damage, company officials said.
“In the 51st year, Hitachi is leading a new era for hard drives—not only providing large amounts of affordable storage, but also customizing and optimizing hard drives to deliver products that are smarter, more durable and more useful to the consumer,” Shinjiro Iwata, chief marketing officer of Hitachi Global Storage Technologies, said in a statement.
To go along with the Deskstar 7K1000, Hitachi will also launch a CinemaStar version 1TB hard drive, which will provide users with a way to store more data on their digital video recorders, company officials said.
The CinemaStar 7K1000 will also be able to retrieve up to 250 hours of high-definition programming, according to the company.
The Deskstar 7K1000 will be available in the first quarter of 2007 at 750GB and 1TB capacities, with the 1TB drive priced at $399. The CinemaStar 1TB will be available in the second quarter of 2007; pricing information has not yet been released.
Hitachi also launched on Jan. 5 its AVSM software technology, which was designed for DVR applications to help extend the life of a hard drive.
The AVSM will also run on STBs (set-top boxes), enabling them to distinguish between streaming applications such as movies and streaming media, and non-real-time applications such as electronic program guides, IPTV downloads, and viewing photos, helping to protect systems from disk fragmentation, company officials said.
“Leveraging Hitachis R&D efforts, weve developed AVSM technology to be complementary to our hard drive solutions—to help address the quality and performance issues that are faced by STB OEMs and content service providers,” Marcia Bencala, vice president of corporate strategy and planning for Hitachi Global Storage Technologies, said in a statement.
AVSM will be able to control several HDTV streams that exist in multiroom households while also having the following features:
- Longer STB service life by lowering hard disk drive duty cycle
- Enhanced quality of service
- A streaming file system and I/O scheduler
The AVSM technology is available now and will soon be integrated into Hitachi products.
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