If your meda library is bursting at the seams with Full HD movies and videos, it's probably time to upgrade to a bigger hard drive – for serious hoarders, around 4TB should do the trick nicely.
Price Watch: An introductory guide to external hard drives and cheap online deals
Hitcachi GTS and Seagate have both announced new external hard drives which boast four terabytes of storage space apiece.
Hitachi's G-RAID and G-DRIVE HDD range will now offer 4TB 7,200 RPM solutions, with the former boasting a whopping 8TB capacity in a two-drive, RAID 0 configuration. Both drives come with 3Gbit eSATA, FireWire 800 and USB 2.0 ports (though not USB 3.0, bafflingly).
Hitachi GTS's 4TB G-Drive.
"Built like a tank, our G-RAID solution has been the cornerstone of our business, and we look forward to bringing our 4TB-based solutions to the market," said Steve Pereira, vice president, Hitachi GST, Europe Middle East and Africa.
Hitachi GTS claims that its 4TB drives are capable of storing over 300 hours of HDV 1080i video. The new G-RAID and G-DRIVE PC drives will be available from October, with Thunderbolt solutions to follow some time in Q4. Pricing has yet to be announced.
Seagate, meanwhile, is launching the GoFlex Desk Drive 4TB (pictured below). It comes with USB 3.0 connectvity, 192-bit Triple DES encription, a dinky 'illuminated capacity gauge', plus Seagate's standard suite of storage and backup software.
The Seagate GoFlex Desk now comes in 4TB capacities.
Seagate’s Dashboard management system is also back to make scheduling backups easier. The Seagate FreeAgent GoFlex Desk 4TB is avalable now, retailing for US$249. [Note: We've just noticed that the 4TB model has yet to appear on Seagate's Australian website, so it might be a month or two before you can snap one up locally.]
