Seagate Delivers World's Fastest Hard Drive For Laptop Computers, Momentus XT SSHDD

[btarunr]

Seagate today announced channel and OEM shipments of the Momentus XT drive, the world’s fastest 2.5-inch laptop PC hard drive, combining SSD-like performance with the massive capacity and much lower cost of HDDs. The Momentus XT drive also features Adaptive Memory – a groundbreaking new technology from Seagate that learns and optimizes the drive’s performance to each user by moving frequently used information into the flash memory for faster access. The Momentus XT solid state hybrid drive boots up to 100 percent faster than traditional 5400RPM drives, the mainstream spin speed for laptop PCs, and sets new benchmarks for real-world system performance for laptops and gaming systems.

Today’s high-performance SSDs for mobile computing cost as much as 10 times more than hard disk drives of the same capacity, with the price of a 250GB SSD outstripping even the cost of many laptop PCs. As a result, most consumers and system builders are unwilling or unable to pay the high price for the greater speed and quiet operations of SSDs. Additionally, SSDs offer fewer capacity options than hard disk drives.



The Momentus XT drive is a best-of-both-worlds solution that combines a 7200RPM spin speed, 4GB of solid state memory and Seagate’s Adaptive Memory technology to deliver unprecedented hard drive performance. The unique Adaptive Memory technology works by identifying patterns in how often certain digital data is used, and then moving the most frequently used information to the embedded solid state memory for faster access – effectively tailoring hard drive performance to each user and their applications.

“For notebook PC users looking forward to faster PC performance without sacrificing storage capacity or affordability, now there’s an option,” according to John Rydning, IDC’s research director for hard disk drives. “Seagate’s new Momentus XT drive is the first storage device for notebook PCs that raises the bar for affordable capacity and performance.”

“We see the Momentus XT drive as a game changer, a product heralding a new generation of hard drives that combine SSD and HDD capabilities so that laptop users don’t have to make trade-offs on speed, cost or capacity,” said Dave Mosley, Seagate executive vice president of Sales, Marketing and Product Line Management. “The feedback we’ve received from customers, industry experts and early reviews has been overwhelmingly positive, and Seagate will continue to drive innovation that provides more value and a better computing experience to consumers.”

Momentus XT Drive Brings Unprecedented Speed to New ASUS Gaming Laptop PC
ASUS has also announced that it will offer the Momentus XT drive as an upgrade option for its new Republic of Gamers (ROG) G73Jh notebook. The system is powered by an Intel i7 720Qm quad-core processor, 8GB of DDR3 memory, and DX11 capable ATI Radeon Mobility HD 5870.

“With the Momentus XT drive, ASUS gives gaming customers who prefer the ASUS ROG G73 the capacity they need and the performance they crave,” said PC Wang, vice president of the ASUS Systems Business Group. “Seagate’s innovative solid state hybrid drive hands down delivers the best value, capacity and SSD-like performance to a wide audience.”

The Momentus XT drive installs as easily as a traditional 9.5mm-high notebook drive for new systems or laptop upgrades and, unlike early hybrid drives, operates independently of the operating system and the motherboard chipset.

ASUS and Seagate Unveil the Momentus XT Drive and the ROG G73JH with a Live Webcast
On Wednesday, May 26, Seagate and OEM customer ASUS will co-sponsor a live webcast unveiling not only the new Momentus XT solid state hybrid drive, but also featuring the new ASUS ROG G73JH system with two Momentus XT drives. Three lucky attendees of this webcast will win a new G73 system just for attending*. Special guest speakers will provide an in-depth look at how this drive will transform high-performance computing. Click here to register for this live webcast.

Seagate also unveils new addition to mainstream Momentus Family: 750GB spinning at 7200RPMs
In addition to the Momentus XT drive, Seagate is delivering the world’s highest capacity 7200RPM drive at 750GB. This new Momentus 750GB drive is a traditional hard disk drive designed for mainstream to high-performance computing and external backup enclosures. The Momentus 750GB drive also features a SATA 3Gb/s with NCQ interface, 16MB cache with silent acoustics and low power consumption. The Momentus 750GB drive delivers high capacity with high performance and further enhances the feature-rich options already available in the Seagate Momentus family of 2.5-inch notebook drives.

[Mussels]

....

[Mr Burns voice]
interesting.
[/Mr Burns voice]

[OneCool]

This was talked about a few years ago and nothing ever came out it.At least one manufacturer is seeing a segment for it.

I dont think that 4gb of SSD will be enough though.


Maybe a 20gb of SSD and 500gb mechanical drive would be better imo.

Would like to see some real world test on this drive

[Mussels]

Originally Posted by OneCool

This was talked about a few years ago and nothing ever came out it.At least one manufacturer is seeing a segment for it.

I dont think that 4gb of SSD will be enough though.


Maybe a 20gb of SSD and 500gb mechanical drive would be better imo.

Would like to see some real world test on this drive

remember that its a cache.

64MB cache -> 4GB cache. these drives WILL be faster, since the most commonly accessed stuff on a PC is small (windows stuff)

Sure it wont make a night and day difference, but overall use will be a lot more pleasant than on a normal 2.5" drive.

[Kreij]

Actually, it's not a cache in the general sense. On a normal HDD the cache gets cleared when the drive powers down. This is non-volatile storage.

I agree with OneCool. Something like a 32GB SSD embedded in a 500GB HDD would be very nice.

[Mussels]

Originally Posted by Kreij

Actually, it's not a cache in the general sense. On a normal HDD the cache gets cleared when the drive powers down. This is non-volatile storage.

I agree with OneCool. Something like a 32GB SSD embedded in a 500GB HDD would be very nice.

non-volatile cache then :P

its still used for the same purpose, just that non volatile is useless with small amounts of cache memory.

[kid41212003]

Isn't that mean everytime the PC is power off and back on, it would have to move those frequently used data back again? Isn't that not really effective..

[Mussels]

Originally Posted by kid41212003

Isn't that mean everytime the PC is power off and back on, it would have to move those frequently used data back again? Isn't that not really effective..

no. it stores it.

we're discussing current cache (16/32/64MB of volatile cache on current mechanical drives) vs 4GB of non-volatile flash memory on these drives.

[btarunr]

Originally Posted by kid41212003

Isn't that mean everytime the PC is power off and back on, it would have to move those frequently used data back again? Isn't that not really effective..

No. Frequently used files stay on the SSD. The SSD is a NAND flash disk. It doesn't go blank with power-down. Depending on the frequency of access to a particular file (or that which you specify), the drive moves them to the NAND (which has SSD transfer rates and access times).

[kid41212003]

If these drives have the same price as current mechanical drives then it's good. If not, then it doesn't make much sense. Because it's just SSD+HDD on the same package. I guess it does make sense for laptop though.

[OneCool]

If the SSD part was big enough to load Windows on and then use the disk for storage then it would be a big plus but I guess Seagate sees it different.

[sandiegoborn32]

Wow, sounds pretty extreme and interesting. How much is this bad noy going to cost? Will it be compatible with all ASUS gaming notebooks? I have an ASUS G50VT-X5 right now at the moment. Will this hard drive be compatible with it? Thanks.

[AsRock]

Originally Posted by kid41212003

Isn't that mean everytime the PC is power off and back on, it would have to move those frequently used data back again? Isn't that not really effective..

Like a defrag in a sence but instead of moving the data most used to the beginning of the HDD it moves it to the SSD part of the drive.


I'm with others who say the SSD is to small but i guess it depends on how it's handled and all so how and what you use your laptop for.

[HalfAHertz]

I'm guessing the controller monitors file access and moves the most accessed files to the flash storage in an effort to reduce average access time. The interesting question is, how do they manage to present the hdd and the flash storage as a single partitionto the system? That must be some really fancy controller...

[Mussels]

Originally Posted by HalfAHertz

I'm guessing the controller monitors file access and moves the most accessed files to the flash storage in an effort to reduce average access time. The interesting question is, how do they manage to present the hdd and the flash storage as a single partitionto the system? That must be some really fancy controller...

the flash would be transparent to the system.

OS requests File X from HDD
Controller on HDD notes that X is in flash memory, and forwards that to the OS, instead of X from the HDD

[slyfox2151]

Start of disk = NAND , once all the space is taken, redirect to start of HDD?

that sounds like it would work. the controller would then just tell the Drive to move the most accesed files to the start of the partition.

[DaJMasta]

Someone's actually implementing that hybrid disk idea we heard about before SSDs were released on the market. By the sound of the 100% increase over a 5400 rpm drive, this could be the raptor equivalent for laptops, still a bit under the true SSD, but a good blend between speed and capacity.

Sounds to me like it will all come down to pricing.

[Mussels]

Originally Posted by DaJMasta

Someone's actually implementing that hybrid disk idea we heard about before SSDs were released on the market. By the sound of the 100% increase over a 5400 rpm drive, this could be the raptor equivalent for laptops, still a bit under the true SSD, but a good blend between speed and capacity.

Sounds to me like it will all come down to pricing.

the next velociraptor needs 16GB of SSD for this stuff

[OneCool]

Review here http://www.anandtech.com/show/3734/s...ood-hybrid-hdd

Here
http://blog.laptopmag.com/seagate-un...200-rpm-drives

Doesnt look bad but double the price of a standard HDD...I dont think its worth it really

[AsphyxiA]

not getting one. I have a laptop and expect to see less performance from this than a high end desktop.

[kid41212003]

Double the price!

....

[Jizzler]

Not bad, it has it's place. But since I don't find myself needing a lot of storage with my netbooks/laptops, will probably stick to using (on sale) 64GB SSDs.

[newtekie1]

It'd be even better if the HDD part would spin down more often since the most commonly used files are on the SDD part, hence yeilding great power savings along with the faster speed.

I'd like to see an 8GB SSD version also.

[BazookaJoe]

It's a great step forward, and "Da-da da Da DAAAA, I'm Loving it!"

[erocker]

I curious as to why they didn't go to SATA 6gbps. One would think it would have a benefit with such a HDD.