Setting the stage for further consolidation in Japan's electronics sector, Toshiba is in talks to buy Fujitsu 's hard-disk drive unit.
Retrieving and storing data from a hard-disk drive takes one million times longer than accessing it from server memory, a difference that can severely degrade application performance.
Fujitsu is eager to shed its loss-making hard-disk drive business, in order to focus on gaining ground against formidable rivals IBM and Hewlett-Packard in information technology services consulting.
Apple, for example, has also frustrated hard-disk drive makers by featuring solid state drives across its line of notebook computers and eliminating spinning disks in the MacBook Air, its thinnest, lightest model.
Seagate (STX) and Western Digital (WDC) shares are trading higher this morning after Citigroup analyst Joe Yoo picked up coverage of the hard-disk drive makers with Buy ratings on both.
FORBES: Disk Drives: Time To Buy Seagate and Western Digital, Citi Says
He is critical of the UBS ETN, meanwhile, for basing itself on an index of 11 constituents, most of which are companies that make, among other things, a type of hard-disk drive currently in vogue.
Xyratex and Intevac shares are both trading sharply higher, in anticipation that the producers of hard-disk drive manufacturing equipment could be a beneficiary from the troubles now plaguing the drive business due to the recent devastating floods in Thailand.
Shares in Toshiba climbed 1.4% after the firm said it would sell its Thailand hard-disk-drive manufacturing subsidiary to U.S. peer Western Digital Corp.
Indeed, this bargain Zeos comes with a paltry half-megabyte memory and a 42-megabyte hard drive, and lacks a floppy disk drive for the new 3-inch disks.
Due to the lower cost per GB of a 2.5-inch hard disk drive, the Archos tablets will offer 250 GB of storage for about the same price as 32 GB of flash memory on a current generation tablet computer.
We test each drive with a Micron 433-MHz Celeron system equipped with 64MB of SDRAM, a 10GB hard disk, and a DVD-ROM drive.
How about eight-window simultaneous multi-display, an Opera-based web browser, DLNA, and a 3TB hard disk drive, 2TB for "time-shift" recording recording up to 26 hours of programs, up to eight channels simultaneously.
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It appears like that Toshiba will end up with 15-20% of the hard disk drive market in unit shipments as a result of the Seagate and Western Digital acquisitions.
FORBES: Toshiba Makes Strategic Partnerships In Order to Compete in Hard Disk Drives
As we approach the general availability of ultrabooks with the Windows 8 operating system it looks like the largest sales for ultra-thin computers will include a hard disk drive as well as flash memory.
Models configured with an ultra-fast SSD flash drive give you ultra-speed access to files around ten times faster than a standard hard disk drive.
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Disk-drive companies were hit hard after key suppliers were knocked out of commission.
The "A-Drive" represents the next generation of storage innovation providing capacities of up to 1 TB Hard Disk Drive (HDD) with 32 GB Solid State Drive (SSD).
Write caching could allow the hard disk drive to stay in a lower power non-spinning state for longer periods of time, extending battery life for the notebook computer.
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Some of the changes involved in the transformation include exiting its PC and hard disk drive businesses in time for the dramatic slow-down that would take place in those industries.
The notebook's external storage options include a LS-120 SuperDisk drive (which also supports 3.5-inch floppy disks), a CD-ROM drive, a DVD ROM drive and hard disk drive options of up to 20G bytes.
"Although challenges to worldwide PC demand remain, such as the pace of global economic recovery and the on-going debt crisis in Western Europe, and even a hard disk drive supply shortage and cost increase, Lenovo remains optimistic that its growth momentum will continue, " it said in a statement.
The Thai flooding created significant shortages in the hard disk drive market that generated millions of dollars of losses for well-known electronics manufacturers.
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Disk-drive maker Western Digital said that production had resumed on its hard drives on November 30, after the facility was pumped dry of flood water, the power was restored and damaged inventories assessed.
While flash memory in a separate smaller capacity SSD module is playing a role in these new ultra-thin computers the introduction of hybrid hard disk drives with a flash cache inside the hard drive may plan a significant role as well.
Replacement and repair of this equipment should provide at least a short term revenue opportunity for companies such as KLA-Tencor, Flexstar, Teradyne and Xyratex as well as a host of other component and hard disk drive assembly and test equipment companies .
FORBES: Capital Equipment Likely Needed for Thailand HDD Factory Repairs
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