Hitachi Global Storage Technologies, basically, what remained from IBM’s HDD division, announced its first batch of products. Some products will not be available for months, so, the issue is purely to attract additional attention to the new company.

The first and probably a very exiting product is 4GB Microdrive, the world’s biggest 1-inch hard disk drive. The new drive will use ultra-miniaturized components, including a new read-write head that is half the size of its predecessor and results in a 40-percent decrease in the height at which the head travels above the disk platter. The Microdrive's new head technology, called the femto slider head, opens up a next generation of head slider technology.

IBM/Hitachi engineers have also increased the tracks per inch to accommodate the Microdrive's areal density of more than 60Gb of data per square inch. The latter was made possible by using a new five-layer version of “Pixie Dust” media technology. This data storage breakthrough is achieved by taking a three-atom-thick layer of the element ruthenium, a precious metal similar to platinum, and sandwiching it between three magnetic layers. Other significant technical achievements include a data transfer rate increase that represents a 50 percent improvement from the previous-generation Microdrive, hence, we can expect the new product to be faster than competitors.

The 4GB Microdrive is designed to the CompactFlash Type II industry standard. The new Microdrive is expected to broaden the variety and complexity of applications that can be run on handheld appliances and other consumer electronic devices. Hitachi currently offers the Microdrive in capacities ranging from 340MB to 1GB. The 4GB Microdrive is expected to be available in the Fall of 2003. Pricing will be announced later this year