Introduction

The 7200.7 line brought us drives with capacities between 40GB to 200GB in PATA version as well as the native SATA (as opposed to bridged SATA solutions) versions with 1.5Gb/sec transfer rates and optional Native Command Queuing, and as you can guess from the name, 7200RPM spindle speeds throughout the entire line. After the 7200.7 series, Seagate decided to split the 7200.x family into two separate lines when introducing the 7200.8 series. The new model carried capacities in the 250GB to 400GB range, again, with both PATA and SATA interfaces, so the 7200.8 was a continuation to higher capacities.


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Today, Seagate officially announces the joining of the 7200.7 and 7200.8 drives with its 7200.9 line of hard disk drives. The new line ranges from 40GB to 500GB and has models with 2MB, 8MB, or a whopping 16MB buffer. The release of the 7200.9 product line announces the 9th generation of Seagate's 7200RPM desktop hard drives and they conform to the latest in SATA standards ("SATA 2.5"), including the 3Gb/sec transfer rates.

The 7200.9 line of hard disk drives brings an end to the separation of powers and is aimed at mid to high end desktop and gaming PCs, media PCs, and low end servers. This classification gives us a bit of insight at the pricing of these new drives, but we will look into the costs of Seagate's new line of mid-performance hard drives a bit later. Right now, we'd like to cover some information that we received during a technical briefing with Seagate's 7200.9 product marketing manager.

The 7200.9 Series
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  • PuravSanghani - Monday, October 10, 2005 - link

    Samsung and Microsoft are actually working on a Hybrid notebook drive which uses OneNAND flash memory currently manufacturered by Samsung itself. The drive, which is still in the development stage, is said to reduce battery use among the speed increases. Google "samsung hybrid" and you shall see.

    Thanks,

    Purav Sanghani
  • semo - Monday, October 10, 2005 - link

    no, thank you.

    semo
  • Spacecomber - Monday, October 10, 2005 - link

    I guess I was expecting something more in an Anandtech article than what apparently is just a summary of a press briefing.

    Maybe this article needs to have a title that clearly designates it for what it is.
  • cryptonomicon - Tuesday, October 11, 2005 - link

    They should add some sort of suffix to all reviews that are really product briefings that just lets you know immediatly that it is mainly MFG information.
  • JNo - Monday, October 10, 2005 - link

    I appreciate that this is manufacturer info rather than independent review but I for one would prefer to know that such a drive is just around the corner and be able to wait rather than shell out for a 7800.8 drive and regret the timing of the purchase. Don't worry, I'll take the manufacturer info & stats with a grain of salt... I can handle it...
  • ss284 - Monday, October 10, 2005 - link

    Agreed. The article states:

    "In the next few weeks we will be looking at the performance of the 500GB 16MB SATA model of the 7200.9. We'll put it through our usual synthetic, simulated, and real world tests, and we'll compare it not only to the 400GB 7200.8, but also to some older drives like the 120GB 7200.8 as well as Maxtor's and Hitachi's higher capacity drives."

    Why didnt they release this article after they did this testing? Obviously they have this drive in their hands already, and theres no NDA. This article should be a flash advertisement on the side of the page instead of a full fledged article.
  • JarredWalton - Monday, October 10, 2005 - link

    "Introducing Seagate's 7200.9: The New Generation"

    Introducing at least to me implies that it's not a review. We (Purav) have the parts on order and will be testing ASAP. The NDA lifted today, and we did not have product in house beforehand. To me, at least - since I've bought quite a few Seagate drives in the past year - the new lineup is important enough to warrant an article of its own.
  • bhtooefr - Monday, October 10, 2005 - link

    If 4 133GB platters give 532GB, then why not use 4 160GB platters, and get 640GB, and leapfrog Hitachi?

    You can use four platters.

    You have 160GB platters.

    Why not do it, and say you've got 600GB before Hitachi?
  • coldpower27 - Tuesday, October 11, 2005 - link


    I think Seagate is comfortable, in thier position of tied for first place, we will probably see a Hitachi 600GB based on the 5 platter design again of 120GB Before we see Seagate match that with a 4x150GB design. Also the other Drive manufacturers need to catch up to this level, namely Wester Digital and Maxtor.
  • Calin - Tuesday, October 11, 2005 - link

    They are now the king of the size, and they will wait until Hitachi launch something bigger until they will launch the 640GB drive.
    Calin

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