Hitachi Reveals Super Skinny 7mm HDDs

Hitachi is launching its new Z-Series of HDDs sporting a 7-mm thickness.

Hard drive manufacturer Hitachi Global Storage Technologies Tuesday launched the Z-Series family of TravelStar and CinemaStar 2.5-inch HDDs, sporting a super-thin size of 7-mm and packed with up to 320 GB of storage on a single platter. This new series will include the TravelStar Z7K320 family, the world's first 7200 RPM, 7-mm 2.5-inch drives, and the CinemaStar Z5K320 family, the first 7-mm drives optimized for audio/video devices.

"From laptops and handhelds to PVRs and blade servers, Hitachi’s new 7-mm Z-series family of TravelStar and CinemaStar drives are designed as a direct replacement for today’s standard 2.5-inch, 9.5-mm hard drives," the company said. "All Hitachi Z-series drives feature common connectors and common mounting points for simple integration into existing systems, and enable greater design flexibility to differentiate and meet market demands for new, thinner, lighter and more robust devices."

In addition to the thin size, the new TravelStar Z7K320 family uses 16 MB of cache and a Serial ATA 3Gb/sec interface. Apparently they're also eco-friendly, incorporating a halogen-free design while offering 1.8 watts read/write power and 0.8 watts low power idle for more unplugged computing time.

Hitachi is also launching the TravelStar Z5K320 family, a less-beefy version with 5400 RPM, 8 MB of cache, and a Serial ATA 3Gb/sec interface. These drives are also slated as eco-friendly, offering 1.6 watts of read/write power and 0.55 watts of low power idle.

As for the CinemaStar Z5K320 family, these 2.5-inch drives provide 5400 RPM, 8 MB of cache, and a Serial ATA 3Gb/sec interface. This family is particularly unique thanks to the 1.9 idle / 2.0 seek bels, making them the quietest 7-mm 2.5-inch drives thus far "for bedroom-quiet systems." Hitachi said that volume shipments of the Travelstar Z5K320 will begin in July. The Travelstar Z7K320 and the CinemaStar Z5K320 drive families will begin to ship in August.