Toshiba announced this week that in 2005 it would become the world's first company to commercialize hard disk drives based on perpendicular magnetic recording. Perpendicular magnetic recording is a key technology that enhances the recording density of hard disk drives.

 

The company plans to begin shipping 1.8-inch, 40GB hard drives between April and June of 2005, followed by an 1.8-inch, 80GB version in the July-September quarter. Production plans call for several thousand units of each type of hard disk drive per month. The initial shipment price is projected at 120,000 yen (approx. US$1,150; 1 USD = 104.36 JPY) for the 40GB drive and 150,000 yen (US$1,437) for the 80GB model. 

 

Toshiba also plans to apply the perpendicular recording technology to 0.85-inch hard disk drives to bring the capacity up to 8GB per platter. The new enhanced hard drives will be used in notebook PCs and portable music players. The storage capacity of the new one-platter hard disk drive is 33% larger than that of Toshiba's conventional models, which use the longitudinal recording method. 

 

The perpendicular magnetic method can record more information than conventional longitudinal recording technology on the same size disk. Data written using the new method is also stored more securely on the disk.