14 DAY TRIAL // 3.5-inch hard drive units don't go beyond 4TB, unless they're HGST helium-filled 6 TB models, or matching solutions, but Toshiba managed to break the threshold with the SAS MG04SCA and SATA MG04ACA.
Sure, they're not made for consumers, but they do come in the standard form factor, and it's not like someone will prohibit you from ordering one of the SATA MG04ACA when (or if) it shows up in retail.
Still, Toshiba made the new drives, known together as the MG04 series, for midline and nearline business critical workloads.
Obviously, the SATA MG04ACA boasts the SATA III 6.0 Gbps interface, while the SAS MG04SCA uses the SAS 6.0 Gbps technology.
Toshiba's persistent write cache technology is implemented on both (optimum performance and data reliability in case of power failure, company claims).
They also have 4K sector length technologies, supporting Advanced Format 512e emulation of legacy sector lengths. It's why the 5 TB capacity was possible.
Finally, the latest industry standard 4K native sector length technologies are supported, for good performance. No reason to let that 7,200 RPM (rotations per minute) platter speed go to waste after all.
"With the MG04 series enterprise capacity disk drives, our customers will benefit from the increased storage capacity and performance made possible by the latest industry-standard long sector technologies," said Scott Wright, product marketing manager at Toshiba Storage Products Business Unit.
"We understand the importance of peace of mind when it comes to data integrity, and persistent cache technology included in this series not only helps protect against data-loss but also helps to improve performance and data reliability."
Toshiba's 5 TB SATA MG04ACA and SAS MG04SCA boast the SATA III interface and come with or without sanitize instant erase (SIE). Shipments will start this month (February 2014), but prices aren't known.