Home Phone and Internet $60/mo- Related Stories
-
Dell unveils MP3 player
October 27, 2003 -
Start-up brings hard drive to the masses
June 3, 2003 -
Tiny Toshiba drives to offer storage aplenty
January 16, 2002
The company's Storage Device Division said Wednesday that it has revised its
The 1.8-inch drive, which has been used in products such as portable music players, is very similar to 2.5-inch hard drives found in notebook computers, but at about the size of a credit card is thinner and lighter.
The smaller size and weight make the 1.8-inch drives useful for handheld devices like Apple Computer's iPod, as well as personal digital assistants (PDAs), handheld GPS (Global Positioning System) devices and miniature notebook computers.
Apple may already be using the new 40GB drive. The company
The 20GB and 40GB drives augment Toshiba's existing line of 1.8-inch drives, which are available in 5GB, 10GB, 15GB and 30GB sizes. The new 20GB drive replaces an earlier one with the same capacity.
"Toshiba continues to build on the 1.8-inch product line to deliver high-capacity drives capable of storing everything from digital music and photos to videos and presentations," Amy Dalphy, the manager of Toshiba's hard drive business unit, said in a statement. The company has also been expanding its manufacturing capacity for the drives to meet demand, she said.
Toshiba is no longer alone in selling a 1.8-inch hard drive for portable devices, however. Although its first 20GB, 1.8-inch hard drive was unchallenged for more than a year, the drive now faces competition from a Hitachi Global Storage product. Hitachi launched a competing line of 1.8-inch hard drives, which offers alternative 15GB and 20GB drives to device makers, this summer. Hitachi has yet to offer 30GB or 40GB drives as part of its 1.8-inch line, but it has won at least one major customer.
Meanwhile, even smaller hard drives are available. Start-up Cornice has created a
