Hitachi Unveils Research, Drive

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Both the value and volume of digital content continues to rise as U.S. consumers amass more music, photos, movies and games, and as they use a growing array of devices to enjoy their content libraries. A recent study conducted by KRC Research and Hitachi Global Storage Technologies (Hitachi GST) found that consumers of all ages have a voracious appetite for digital content and the average dollar value of these stored collections has now reached $1,660 per person, up 46 percent from just three years ago.

On average, U.S. consumers now store 907 songs, 924 photos, 25 movies and 7 games on their digital audio players, digital cameras, camera phones, digital video recorders (DVRs) and desktop or notebook computers. Compared to what they stored in 2005, this represents a:

This survey provides a snapshot into the digital storage needs, behaviors and attitudes of Americans. It indicates that we have now entered what Hitachi calls the Tera Era,” where the amount of digital information being created, accessed, shared and stored around the world continues to grow at an unrelenting pace.

The intersection of three dynamic elements -- capacity, content and culture -- has resulted in explosive growth in the amounts and types of information people are now storing. Megabytes are long forgotten. Today, gigabytes are being replaced by terabytes, hence the Tera Era. A Hitachi white paper and more details about the Tera Era can be found at www.hitachigst.com/TeraEra.The KRC Research and Hitachi study polled 1,008 adults (ages 18-65+) during May of 2008. Comparisons were then made to the findings from the same survey that KRC Research and Hitachi conducted in 2005. Key findings from the 2008 study are summarized below.

In a separate release:

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- With today’s announcement of its second-generation one terabyte hard drive, the Deskstar 7K1000.B, Hitachi Global Storage Technologies (Hitachi) is forecasting the dawn of a new age in technology that it has dubbed the “Tera Era.” As the amount of digital information created, captured and duplicated around the world continues to grow at an uninterrupted, unrelenting pace, Hitachi’s vision is that three elements – rich media content, culture, and increasing capacity – are uniting to create an entirely new landscape for enterprise and consumer data storage. It is against this exciting backdrop that Hitachi is announcing the Deskstar 7K1000.B, the world’s most energy-efficient 7,200 RPM one terabyte (1TB) hard drive.

The Deskstar 7K1000.B provides an exceptional blend of power efficiency and performance, making it an ideal solution for power-friendly consumer and commercial PCs. The new three-disk design improves idle power consumption up to 43 percent over its 1TB predecessor, which was already among the industry’s most energy efficient hard drives. Increased protection against data loss and piracy is provided via Bulk Data Encryption (BDE) which is available as an optional feature to users. Hitachi is also shipping the Deskstar E7K1000, designed to provide high-capacity storage for low-duty-cycle, 24x7 applications.

Hitachi debuted the industry’s first 1TB hard drive in January 2007 to address consumers’ insatiable appetite for storage capacity. Entire libraries of photos, movies, music and games are increasingly being stored and accessed from a variety of digital entertainment devices within the home and a plethora of mobile devices. As the distribution of video content to social networking sites and to handheld devices becomes more commonplace, storage capacity requirements will only continue to increase. Hitachi’s latest terabyte drive delivers the performance and capacity required for today’s increasingly mobile digital lifestyle.The new 7,200 RPM, 3.5-inch drives are available in a range of capacities from 160GB to 1TB. The drives are built using Hitachi’s proven and patented perpendicular magnetic recording (PMR) heads and disks, delivering a maximum of 375GB of storage per disk with a high level of reliability.

“Hitachi pioneered the industry’s first terabyte hard drive, so we are pleased to see how the market for high capacity desktop and laptop drives has grown substantially in the past year,” said Larry Swezey, director, Consumer and Commercial HDD Marketing and Strategy, Hitachi Global Storage Technologies. “Now through the application of Hitachi’s advanced head, media and channel technologies, we can bring to market a terabyte drive using only three disks that has advanced performance and best-in-class power consumption. This will allow us to take the next step in making terabyte technology available and affordable in the personal storage, consumer electronics, desktop and enterprise segments.”

Hitachi Global Storage Technologies (Hitachi GST)