Since they were first invented, hard drives have steadily become faster, more reliable and more capacious, as well as more compact and efficient. This trend is visible in all areas of the IT industry, as all the technology is evolving into forms that are capable of higher performances at reduced costs. Currently, the areal density used in high-end, two-platter hard drives is of 500GB per platter. Still, TDK is reportedly planning on moving, in the case of 3.5-inch hard disks, to platters with a density of 640GB.

The 640GB data capacity will enable hardware makers to start manufacturing 3.5-inch, four-platter storage units with capacities of 2.5TB, as well as five-platter, 3TB HDDs . TDK aims to upgrade to this new platter as soon as the following month. In addition, for 2.5-inch drives, there already are 375GB platters and certain companies will be able to start using such technology even as soon as February. While, currently, 320GB per platter is the limit for such units, the increase will enable storage-unit makers to create two-platter notebook hard drives with a 750GB storage.

Solid state drives have already begun to appear, or have been promised to appear, in capacities of up to 512GB. Considering their significantly higher read and write speeds, such devices will become an even stronger competition on the storage front. The development of higher capacity platters helps preserve the capacity gap between the two storage technologies.

In the case of 640GB platters, all companies are expected to adopt it by the end of November, as more data per platter will always appeal to any end-user. In addition, as far as 2.5-inch HDD platters are concerned, companies are expected to transition to the 375GB density by October. As such, this year's winter holiday season will most likely see the emergence of a fair number of 2.5TB 3.5-inch drives and 2.5-inch hard disks with 750GB capacities.