MCE Technologies, LLC (MCE) is now selling a 160GB 5400 RPM hard drive for the PowerBook, iBook and Mac mini. The MCE MobileStor 160GB/5400RPM drive (US$399) is the highest capacity 2.5-inch drive available for these machines and includes an 8MB cache buffer.
The drive’s engineers have developed a method of standing data bits on end within the disks platters as opposed to the previous method of hard disk data recording which was to lay the bits down horizontally, parallel to the platter. Since the platter’s depth is now used to store bits vertically through the platter, more bits can be packed into the platter… hence the higher capacity.
In addition, because a slightly thicker recording layer is used the risk of thermal decay is decreased and this greatly enhances reliability in demanding high temperature and rugged operating environments. The MCE MobileStor 160GB PowerBook hard drive has sustained data transfer rates of up to 44MB per second with burst transfer rates of up to 100MB per second. The drive is also designed with an 8MB read and write cache buffer. This allows the drive to anticipate what data will be requested next by the PowerBook and the drive will pre-load this data into its cache buffer.
If the PowerBook requests this pre-loaded data then the drive responds immediately, transmitting the data from its super-fast cache buffer, eliminating completely the latency involved in having to search for the data on its disk. The larger the cache, the greater chance the data will already be pre-loaded. Since most drives include only a 2MB buffer, the MobileStor 160GB’s 8MB buffer gives it a further performance advantage.
The mechanism is a Momentus 5400.3 from Seagate Technology LLC with an Ultra ATA/100 interface, so it won’t work in the new MacBook Pro. A second version with a faster Serial ATA interface will be available later this year according to Seagate.
MCE Technologies, LLC (MCE) is now selling a 160GB 5400 RPM hard drive for the PowerBook, iBook and Mac mini. The MCE MobileStor 160GB/5400RPM drive (US$399) is the highest capacity 2.5-inch drive available for these machines and includes an 8MB cache buffer.
The drive’s engineers have developed a method of standing data bits on end within the disks platters as opposed to the previous method of hard disk data recording which was to lay the bits down horizontally, parallel to the platter. Since the platter’s depth is now used to store bits vertically through the platter, more bits can be packed into the platter… hence the higher capacity.
In addition, because a slightly thicker recording layer is used the risk of thermal decay is decreased and this greatly enhances reliability in demanding high temperature and rugged operating environments. The MCE MobileStor 160GB PowerBook hard drive has sustained data transfer rates of up to 44MB per second with burst transfer rates of up to 100MB per second. The drive is also designed with an 8MB read and write cache buffer. This allows the drive to anticipate what data will be requested next by the PowerBook and the drive will pre-load this data into its cache buffer.
If the PowerBook requests this pre-loaded data then the drive responds immediately, transmitting the data from its super-fast cache buffer, eliminating completely the latency involved in having to search for the data on its disk. The larger the cache, the greater chance the data will already be pre-loaded. Since most drives include only a 2MB buffer, the MobileStor 160GB’s 8MB buffer gives it a further performance advantage.
The mechanism is a Momentus 5400.3 from Seagate Technology LLC with an Ultra ATA/100 interface, so it won’t work in the new MacBook Pro. A second version with a faster Serial ATA interface will be available later this year according to Seagate.
