37TB drives by 2010?

Seagate may achieve an exponential increase in hard disk storage limits in as little as three years' time, according to Electronista. The storage device maker has revealed that a technology called heat-assisted magnetic recording, which uses a laser to temporarily heat the platter and store more information in a given area, could increase the density of hard drives to just over 6TB per square inch. The new technology would allow full, 3.5-inch wide desktop hard drives to store 37.5TB of data. The increased space would hold the entire Library of Congress catalog in raw form, according to Seagate, and the company revealed that it is working on a small magnetic form of storage codenamed "Probe" that would compete directly with flash memory. Seagate failed to reveal details about capacity or performance with regard to the new technology, but suggested availability within the next few years.

by MacNN Staff