Hitachi ships 500GB Travelstar 7K500: 7200RPMs in a 2.5-inch form factor
By Darren Murph 
posted September 1st 2009 3:01AM
posted September 1st 2009 3:01AM
Hitachi GST Unleashes Ultra Fast Half Terabyte Mobile Hard Disk Drive
New 7200 RPM Travelstar Drive Delivers High Capacity and Industry-Leading Performance with Eco-Friendly Features; Optional Data Encryption Helps Keep Data Safe and Secure
SAN JOSE, Calif. – September 1, 2009 – Building on years of innovation, Hitachi Global Storage Technologies (Hitachi GST) today announced that is it shipping its fifth-generation, 7200 RPM mobile hard disk drive. The Hitachi® Travelstar™ 7K500 is a 500GB, 2.5-inch, 3Gb/s SATA drive designed for notebooks, gaming systems and professional external storage solutions. Combining leadership performance, ruggedness and capacity, Travelstar 7K500 is ideal for multitasking, gaming and other graphic-intensive applications. The new Travelstar 7K500 is the fastest hard drive in its class and delivers up to 56 percent higher capacity and 16 percent better application performance than its predecessor1. It also provides best-of-breed operating shock and outstanding power management for sturdy, unplugged notebook performance.
"Portable PC shipment growth continues to be one of the most significant market drivers underpinning 2.5-inch disk drive demand, and is a major reason why IDC expects the 2.5-inch mobile HDD market will grow at a 16.8 percent 2008-2013 compound annual growth rate," said John Rydning, research director for hard disk drives at IDC. "Hitachi's new 500GB mobile 2.5-inch HDD with a 7,200 rpm spin-speed provides PC OEMs an opportunity to differentiate PCs with both capacity and performance."
Meeting Standards for Mobile Security
Due to their value and portability, notebooks and external storage devices are highly susceptible to theft. If those devices fall in the wrong hands, sensitive data stored on the drive could become compromised. To help combat this issue, Hitachi GST has been providing hardware-based Bulk Data Encryption (BDE) as an option on its Travelstar mobile hard drives for four generations. Travelstar 7K500 is one of the first mobile drives to be compliant with the Trusted Computing Group's (TCG) Opal storage security specification, a new open standard designed to strengthen data protection and safeguard notebooks in the event of system loss or theft.
When the Hitachi BDE option is enabled, the hard drive will encrypt all data that comes from the system as it is written to the media. When read back, the drive decrypts the data so that it can be understood by the system. Since the hard drive is doing the encryption work, there is no impact on system performance. A Hitachi hard drive with BDE is always automatically encrypting data, so the system user never has to worry about whether or not the data is being protected. For commercial or corporate IT managers with a large pool of systems, BDE also speeds up and simplifies the drive re-deployment process. By deleting the encryption key, the data is rendered unreadable, thereby eliminating the need for time-consuming data-overwrite.
To learn more about Hitachi BDE and the TCG Opal specification, please view the following videocast.
"With Hitachi's support for the TCG Opal specification, we're working with industry leaders who are enabling more widespread adoption and interoperability across the entire storage ecosystem," said Brendan Collins, vice president of Product Marketing at Hitachi Global Storage Technologies. "With the launch of the Travelstar 7K500, Hitachi continues to solidify its position as the segment and technology leader in this space."
Low-Power Performer
Travelstar 7K500 has been designed for energy efficiency with superior low power consumption at 0.69 watts idle power and 1.8 watts during read/write operations, which contributes to longer battery life in notebooks and other mobile applications. The Travelstar 7K500 is also the latest drive to be distinguished by the Hitachi EcoTrac classification due to its low power, halogen-free design, RoHS compliance and steps in eco-friendly product design, manufacturing, operation and disposal.
Availability
Travelstar 7K500 is now shipping in limited quantities to top tier OEMs. Volume shipments will begin this month. Capacities include 120GB, 160GB, 250GB, 320GB and 500GB. Hitachi will offer an enhanced-availability (EA) version, available in 160GB to 500GB capacities in November '09. The EA version is specifically designed for applications requiring 24x7 operation in lower transaction environments, such as blade servers, network routers and surveillance systems.
That's a mighty fine first image..
I see what you did there
I've had 3 WDs fail and 1 Hitachi fail so far. No issues with Samsung, yet.
Hitachi Deskstars are very popular HDDs, so I wouldnt worry about the credibility of them.
I only use Western Digital and i've never had a drive fail. I currently own a 1TB "Green" WD Caviar and a 150GB WD RaptorX. Had the Raptor for about 3 or 4 years and it's still going strong after multiple reformats.
I'm looking to build a cheap, small, low-powered pc and may consider this for it.
Anyone know if the advertised power usage on this drive is considered really low for HDDs this size and speed?
I think a lot of people still have the bad memories of the "deathstar" hard-drives failing. I know because I was one of them. As much as I want to try Hitachi again, I rather play it safe (currently sticking with WD).
Oh well then I guess i better get my shit straight. I thought Hitachi made a very solid HDD, but I have never used one. Think i'll give one a shot.
I had a Deathstar 2 gig in my home rig a number of years back; of course this was an IBM drive back before Hitachi bought IBM's storage unit and became Hitachi Global Storage.
My '02 G3 iBook which was my first Mac also suffered a failing hard disk. To this day those two drives are the only drives that have ever failed on my personal equipment.
Tear the iBook apart, surprise surprise, Apple-stickered IBM Travelstar.
To be honest, though, obviously Hitachi makes great drives. You don't pay out the ass for their SAN stuff for nothing.
Disks fail. Constantly. I replace a drive on an average of once a week, I'd say. I pay zero attention to the manufacturer, they all die. Just buy what's cheap.
Samsung 5400rpm 1.5T 3.0GBps SATA drives w/32MB cache are on sale at Fry's for $99 'till September 3 so I picked up a pair of them. Closest price is newegg @120, and being a CA resident I'd have to pay tax AND shipping if I ordered from them. I had only planned on getting a 1T and a 1.5T but for the price might as well pickup two.
One's serving as a big media drive, and the other is my Time Machine drive backing up the media drive and my 2x320GB WD RAID 0 main volume. Like all drives, they'll fail sooner or later :)
Wow. Is that why I went through somewhere around 4 HDDs in my iBook G3? That was the only computer I ever had that had HDD failure. I've since had an iBook G4, a Toshiba Satellite, and currently a Dell Vostro 1500. Also a desktop that I put together myself. I know a bit more now. :P
Too bad Seagate has had these for awhile now. Two are sitting on my desk, about to be installed in my 13-inch MacBook Pro.
hahah you got the "cheap macbook pro".
I have to R61 Lenovo's that have been running just fine with the Seagates for a while now. Atleast $30 cheaper as well.
Damn I want a 13" MBP. Also, Jon's a 'tard.
I installed the 7200RPM 500GB seagate in my 15" macbook pro only to have it fail 3 weeks later. Anyone who has changed a HDD in a pre-unibody MBP knows its a major PITA. I replaced it with a WD 5400 500GB, and use the warrantied Seagate as a portable. I may stick it back inside one day but like I said laptop surgery isnt fun when its your only machine. HDD's fail, I dont have any hate for seagate, me prevvy was the junior of this Hitachi the 7200 320 and it was a solid drive.
Ditto, had the Seachange Momentus 7200.4 500GB 7,200 rpm 2.5" drive in my laptop for some time now. Not sure why this is even news on Engadget at this point honestly.
Nothing wrong with the Seagate that I can see, other than even bigger would be better. But hey, competition is always nice, and who knows, that Hitachi drive might actually be available before Christmas rolls around!
Hey Engadget, when the first X rpm drive at the biggest size in that form factor is announced/ships/is available that might be news. But the second one? Leave that for the reviewers...
Nice stuff;)
"Form factor"?
It's time to admit that this dumb term doesn't make you sound more "high tech".
What on earth would you call it then?
2.5-inch shape?
See the inexplicably separated reply below.
my seagate ST9500420ASG is yawning.
yes, but is it clicking and beeping as well?
My notebook's got a Seagate 7200rpm 500GB running in it for the past few months already...
Dunno why this drive is newsworthy unless it draws less power than Seagate's.
I've had the same drive in my MBP for some time now...and according to http://www.seagate.com/docs/pdf/datasheet/disc/ds_momentus_7200_4.pdf
the Seagate draws less power still (although probably only what would amount to a few extra minutes of battery time).
nothing beats WD just WD doesn't have 7200 RPM notebook factor (read not server) 500GB HDD...(only 5400rpm blue scorpios)
now, go and hide :)
Hmm.. nothing about height.. I'd love to see if a 7200rpm drive would fit in my PS3.
height of 12.5 mm
Reviewed on Tom's recently:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/500gb-notebook-hdd,1960-3.html
Apologies hadn't opened my eyes properly; 12.5mm was actually the 5K500.
The 7K500 is 9.5mm
exactly what I was thinking. This would find a nice cozy home in my PS3. im running low on space in my 320GB
As long as this doesn't cause my computer to lock every minute, i'd consider buying this~~~~
I've been a fan of Seagate, but recently it's been a hindrance... WD in my opinion is my favorite drive.
yeah, what heightß netbook compatible finally?
damnit! is there any fast and power efficient 500GB (or smaller if not] in 9,5mm out there?
For years, "size" proved to be a perfectly satisfactory term.
Then it became oh-so-techie to say "form factor" all the time, when what was really meant was "size" or "design" or "shape".
A factor is something that's multiplied by something else, typically. And the other meanings don't make sense either (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/factor).
Then again, we still see terms like "XGA" on here, when most of the planet switched to stating actual numeric resolutions sometime after "Super VGA" fell out of fashion.
Nice comment threading, Engadget. Jeez.
@IC
You're absolutely right. A drive is a drive. It's one shape, rectagular, and boxy. Form factor is a different, oh I dunno.. FORM? Take cell phones. Candybar vs flip-phone. Those are different form factors. A 2.5" hard drive vs a 1.8" vs a 3.5" are different sizes, not form factors.
Also, I'm with you about the screen resolutions. WUXGA? Zzz... I'd rather just hear 1920x1200.
*thinking of a way to counter your statement*
*thinking of a way to counter your statement*
I like my hard drives blended to pieces, now that is a form factor
"Size" could refer to the data capacity, while "form factor" implies physical dimensions/shape/style. It's a different term for a more specific concept.
There are defined sizes to fit in defined spaces, this is important for laptops, that the disk is a certain size does not say it's necessarily the same width and height and depth and can fit in a standard space for such devices, that's why the term formfactor indicates it's a industry standard size in all relevant respects and not just X inches/centimeter wide.
Same goes for other times it's used, it's indicating several measurements that conforms to a known entity or design.
This is going in my T500. Should do everything I need.
PS3 HERE I COME
I've had 3 samsungs die and no WDs.
I wonder how noisy this HDD will be. Will is click and whine during operation like many Seagate's?
I have to replace and rma drives all the time, and whenever it comes time to ship, I always end up with two to three times more Seagate than Western Digital. Following on the heels of their craptastic 1.5tb drives, we got hit with the Seagate ST2500320AS firmware bug, and we had at least one hundred of those drives in use. They started to drop like flies, even after the firmware "fix" that they released, that didn't fix a damn thing. Now I'm sending the same refurb drives back to them for a second and third time. I hate Seagate.
Then why do you keep buying them? Moth syndrome?
They are still covered under warranty, so what other choice is there other to send them in for replacement. 100 x Western Digital 500gb drives to replace them? No doubt ordering nine thousand dollars worth of drives I don't absolutely need would get me fired faster than Oprah on a cupcake.
*shakes fist at Engadget comment system*
omg, i only bought my seagate 500gb 7200 2.5 with Full Disk Encryption 2 month ago.. thanks for being late
Seagate bought Maxtor, I think thats where their problems stem from ;)
Sadly, still not available at retail in North America at this late date.
This hard drive is finally available in retail and shipping as of November 25th:
For example, check Newegg for pricing and such.
I just ordered one for my 15" macbook pro; since my lapppie is the previous gen (pre-unibody) it's going to be a major pita swapping the drives :(