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Itty-Bitty Bits

Sep 1, 2004 12:00 PM, By S. D. Katz

Big Storage in Small Packages

Science is great. I can now back up my entire digital output from 1990 to 1996 on a single drive the size of a deck of cards, which replaces 10 older hard drives, several boxes of SyQuest cartridges, and a stack of Jaz disks. Price of the new drive: dinner for two at Nobu in New York.

Processors get faster, LCD panels get bigger, and compression schemes become more efficient, but storage is the lifeblood of all other parts of a digital system and the one that is purchased most frequently. No advance in digital production is as dramatic as the price and capacity of storage.

Yes, we want to pay less for more gigabits, but it's not just about the biggest drives. Today, miniaturization is almost as important as increased capacity. We are now seeing hard drives beginning to compete with solid-state memory, reducing size and complexity. Witness the parallel paths of Panasonic and Sony's storage solution for cameras. Panasonic has bet on solid-state memory and Sony is betting on blue laser. As you can see here, micro drives can now fit in an iPod, while flash memory is moving into the gigabyte range.

While capacity and price/performance have shown impressive improvement over the last decade, access speed and transfer times evolve more slowly. Today's single hard drives still move data in the 32MBps to 42MBps range in high-capacity FireWire drives, and up to 75MBps in low-capacity SCSI drives — only slightly better performance than four years ago. That's where the next breakthrough needs to happen, which will be great news for cameras, HD NLEs, and other high data rate applications.

1. Toshiba

• O.85in. hard disk drive
• More than a gigabyte in less than an inch.
• 2GB to 4GB (over the next year)
• Use: digital cameras, iPods, PDAs www.toshiba.com

2. EZQuest

• EZ-Disk USB 2.0 Flash Drives
• 1.88'×0.75'×0.13'
• 4 grams in weight
• Transfer speeds of 950KBps for the 128MB capacity
• Capacities: 128MB, 256MB, 512MB, 1GB, 2GB
• Use: portable file storage www.ezq.com

3. SanDisk

• Ultra II CompactFlash
• Ultra II cards are available in consumer electronics stores and other retail channels.
• 256MB to 2GB capacities
• Use: digital cameras, card reader, adapters www.sandisk.com

4. Toshiba

• ATA 2.5in. hard disk drive (MK1031GAS)
• 100GB capacity
• Use: music players, cameras, handheld PCs, laptops www.toshiba.com

5. Hitachi Global Storage

• Deskstar 7K400
• The largest single 3.5in. drive
• ATA 400GB capacity
• Use: HD disk arrays, backup storage, massive single file SD video drive www.hitachigst.com

6. LaCie

• Bigger Disk Extreme
• The biggest single 5.25in. drive
• 1.6TB of data capacity
• FireWire 800
• Use: HD disk arrays, backup storage, even more massive single file SD video drive www.lacie.com

7. BiTMICRO Networks

• E-Disk Fibre Channel solid-state drives (SSD)
• 3.5in. form factor
• 155GB capacity
• Sustained read/write up to160MBps
• Use: cameras, portable storage where ruggedness is required www.bitmicro.com

8. Medéa

• G-RAID
• FireWire 400 and 800
• Supports multistream uncompressed SD, DVCPRO HD, HDV, and DV non-linear video editing systems.
• 160GB, 320GB, and 500GB capacities
• Transfer rate is 75Mbs, which is good enough for 10-bit uncompressed SD-RAID. www.medea.com

9. Huge Systems

• MediaVault Dual Max (dual channel)
• 600GB to 2.5TB in a single chassis
• Ultra160 SCSI interface
• Use: Uncompressed HD video for NLE systems; massive, very fast storage www.hugesystems.com

10. BlueArc Corporation

• Titan SiliconServer NAS
• Up to 256TB capacity in single server pool
• Throughput up to 20Gbps of data throughput with a simple modular upgrade
• Use: data backup and studio server (used by Charlex, The Mill, Rhythm & Hues) www.bluearc.com

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