Hybrid drives is a concept that Seagate started to play with as early as last year, and the company is doing so again, though this time it seems to be more serious business.
Granted, even the first time around was serious business, but more of the experimental type than now.
Hybrid drives may still not be past the initial phases of market assessment, but they might just take off, especially now that regular HDDs are being plagued by this or that (and XT already sold in over 1 million).
Thus, Seagate made a new Momentus XT, with double the NAND Flash capacity and half more HDD storage space.
The 8 GB of flash will hold the files most frequently used, as well as the ones accessed during startup, so as to make booting and application launching very fast.
Meanwhile, the actual files, especially the big ones that don't often get utilized, are held quaintly by the platters.
Speaking of the HDD part, Seagate built the new Momentus XT with a capacity of 750 GB.
The SATA 6.0 Gbps interface is what allows it to match the performance of some solid state drives, like the Intel 320 Series.
The prowess is not really at the level of SandForce-enabled drives, though, but that is just as well, because the Seagate product is supposed to be a more affordable alternative to those finance-draining beasts.
“Laptop users want faster access to all of their content, from gaming, music and video to spreadsheets and documents, creating strong demand for the highest performance,” said Scott Horn, vice president of Worldwide Marketing at Seagate.
“Seagate is excited to answer this need with a second-generation Momentus XT drive that delivers solid state drive (SSD) speed, greater storage capacity and easy installation at an affordable price.”
Momentus XT should show up online soon, if it hasn't already, for $245 (183.71 Euro).
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