Fujitsu Pushes Notebook Drives to 500 GB

Fujitsu has announced a 500 GB, 2.5-inch hard disk drive for notebook computers...but it's a little too thick to be a drop-in upgrade.

Fujitsu is pushing the capacity of its notebook hard disk drives to 500 GB, announcing its new three-platter MHZ2 BT hard disk drives. Slated to be available at the end of May 2008, the drives sport a 3 Gb/s SATA interface and consumer just 1.8 Watts of power during read and write operations, helping extend battery life on portable devices.

Fujitsu is the third drive manufacturer to announced 2.5-inch devices with a 500 GB capacity: Hitachi and Samsung have also announced 500 GB devices, with Hitachi’s scheduled to hit the market this month and Samsung’s in March. Where Hitachi and Samsung’s drive spin at 5,400 rpm, the Fujitsu MHZ2 BT spin at a power-saving 4,200 rpm. Fujitsu claims a 12 ms average seek time, and 14 ms average write time.

In addition to notebook computers, all three companies are targeting the digital video recorder market, where low-power, high-capacity drives offer greater recording capacity, make less noise, and take up less space in set-top boxes.

Fujitsu hasn’t announced pricing for the MHZ2 BT; however, they won’t be a drop-in upgrade or replacement for many notebook owners. The MHZ2 BT’s three-platter design means its 12.5 mm thick, making it too big to fit in the 9.5 mm typically allotted for a 2.5-inch hard drive in a notebook computer. Samsung claims its three-platter 500 GB Spinpoint M6 drive is still just 9.5 mm in height.