WD 5mm HDD Hybrid Drive: Even Thinner Mini?

[hleewell]

I have come across this today:

http://www.electronista.com/articles/13/04/23/thinner.drives.use.single.edge.connector.to.save.space/

Get ready for an even thinner Mac Mini.

 

[justperry]

I hope NOT, I prefer Hitachi's drives instead of crappy WD, way more problems than the former.

Skinnier, for what????

 

[g4cube]

WD owns HGST which is the new name for Hitachi.

 

[Bear]

I hope NOT, I prefer Hitachi's drives instead of crappy WD, way more problems than the former.

Skinnier, for what????

I guess it depends on whether that drive is a WD or Hitachi based design. In general from what I'm hearing is that WD drives don't seem to be bad as they used to be. However, that is for teh bare drive and not for the disk enclosures they make.

WD owns HGST which is the new name for Hitachi.

We're basically down to 2 major hard disk manufacturers now. Seagate and Western Digital. I've lost track of which others are still separate companies, but they're much smaller players - especially in the US market.

 

[Mr. Retrofire]

WD owns HGST which is the new name for Hitachi.

Hitachi as a brand is is not equal to Hitachi Global Storage Technologies (HGST), and HGST is a pretty old brand (founded 2003).

 

[philipma1957]

well will 5mm tech mean that a 9.5 mm hdd can hold a 2TB? Quite frankly I do not care about skinny as much as capacity. As for a thinner smaller miniI could not care less.

Now a smaller mac pro with a real video card yeah that I would want. Make this size gear the new mac pro.


http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2268192&

this can fit 3 3.5 inch hdds. maybe 6 2.5's

a msata as a booter
a bluray or dvd
a full sized nvidia gtx 680 or a full sized hd7970
a full sized power supply. I am sure apple can make it look good.

 

[g4cube]

Hitachi as a brand is is not equal to Hitachi Global Storage Technologies (HGST), and HGST is a pretty old brand (founded 2003).

Sorry, I was not clear or precise.

The previous IBM disk drive business was acquired by Hitachi Data Systems a few years ago. This was primarily the 3.5" and 2.5" bare drive business. HDS is part of conglomerate Hitachi.

The 3.5" and 2.5" bare drive business was acquired by WD. Part of the 3.5" WD business had to be sold off to Toshiba due to request by Chinese government for approval of the Hitachi drive business sale to WD. Further, the agreement required that the Hitachi drive business be separate from the WD. HGST is the name used by the Hitachi 3.5" and 2.5" business, and it operates as a separate subsidiary within WD.

Further, G-Technology is within the HGST subsidiary.

The bare drives are marketed as HGST drives; previously marketed as Hitachi, and prior to that IBM.

 

[Giuly]

Part of the 3.5" WD business had to be sold off to Toshiba due to request by Chinese government for approval of the Hitachi drive business sale to WD.

Wasn't it HGST's 3.5" business that was sold to Toshiba, not WD's?

 

[opinio]

I have come across this today:

Image
http://www.electronista.com/articles/13/04/23/thinner.drives.use.single.edge.connector.to.save.space/

Get ready for an even thinner Mac Mini.

A 5mm hard drive is almost too thin for the universal 3mm screw thread diameter.

 

[Reason077]

I'd like to see a 5mm thin iPhone

 

[Fishrrman]

We don't need a "thinner" Mini.

On the contrary, we need one with a removable "top plate", to make the removal/addition/replacement of the internal hard drive more accessible.

 

[g4cube]

Wasn't it HGST's 3.5" business that was sold to Toshiba, not WD's?

Yes, you are correct. That certain assets of the HGST 3.5" business were sold to Toshiba to meet the demands of the Chinese government.

 

[Luap]

We need a thinner mini about as much as we needed a thinner iMac Either way, the thickness of current drives, SSD or otherwise doesn't really dictate how thin a Mini can be. If Apple wanted they could already make a thinner Mini using existing drive technology.

 

[gregorsamsa]

We need a thinner mini about as much as we needed a thinner iMac Either way, the thickness of current drives, SSD or otherwise doesn't really dictate how thin a Mini can be. If Apple wanted they could already make a thinner Mini using existing drive technology.

Agreed! IMO, far better that they make it higher.

Mindful that Apple won't want to risk cannibalizing their iMacs, but I'd still like to see a future Mini offer better GPU options. Something like a mid-range, power-efficient HD 7750 with 1GB GDDR5 VRAM would be a start. Far rather that than keep dumbing down their lower-end desktop Macs for the sake of superficial appearance.

 

[cube]

Yes, you are correct. That certain assets of the HGST 3.5" business were sold to Toshiba to meet the demands of the Chinese government.

Some of the 3.5" desktop products were sold to Toshiba in exchange for a 2.5" manufacturing plant.

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A 5mm hard drive is almost too thin for the universal 3mm screw thread diameter.

The 5mm hard drives have a different SATA connector anyway.

 

[MJL]

When the HDD increased in size by differently orientation the magnetic layer (IIRC going to 500 Gb and beyond) Hitachi had a problem to adapting to that new technology.