HGST, which was previously known as Hitachi Global Storage Technologies and is now a WD company, has announced a new mobile hard drive. While normally we find it difficult to get excited over hard drives, it happens once in a while that something quite remarkable surfaces that catches our attention. This time, we're talking about one of the highest capacity 2.5" drives that has hit the market to date. While the biggest 2.5" hard drive is a 2 TB model, there aren't particularly many options from which to choose if you want a 2 TB or 1.5 TB mobile hard drive. The good news is that a new competitor has just joined the playing field for 2.5" hard drives with a 1.5 TB capacity.
The 5K1500 features a three-platter design that stores 500 GB per platter. The drive runs at a speed of 5400 RPM and has a 32 MB cache. Moreover, the drive features a SATA3 interface. While it's likely to give any added benefits over an older SATA2 interface, it's still nice to know that your drive is equipped with the latest standards in connectivity. The drive has a 9.5 mm form factor.
"Contrary to popular belief, the mobile hard drive market is not being replaced by SSDs. We continue to invest in and serve both the traditional 9.5 mm and 7 mm thin and light HDD mobile markets as they offer the best cost-per-GB, performance and proven product reliability for high-capacity, mainstream, Ultrabook and A/V content creation notebook markets. HGST continues to have a strong share in the 2.5-inch market and the new Travelstar 5K1500 hard drive is the latest addition to our broad line of 5,400 and 7,200 RPM 2.5-inch drives, giving OEMs, ODMs and integrators an opportunity to grow and differentiate their product lines," said Brendan Collins, HGST's VP of product marketing.
So far there has been no word on pricing for the 5K1500 drive, however, it is expected to be released into the marketplace somewhere in Q3 2013.
