IBM Quadruples Disk Drive Density

IBM doesn't think that your hard drive is big enough and, if your thinking about using your computer as a digital VCR, they may be right. The Boys in Armonk will mass-produce computer hard disk drives using a new type of magnetic coating that the company says may eventually quadruple the data density of hard drives. The key to IBM's storage breakthrough is a three-atom-thick layer of the element ruthenium, a precious metal similar to platinum, sandwiched between two magnetic layers. According to IBM, scientists refer to the ruthenium layer as "pixie dust." Technically (but not as sickeningly cute), the technology is known as "antiferromagnetically-coupled (AFC) media." The multilayer coating may permit hard disks to store 100 billion bits (gigabits) of data per square inch of disk area by 2003. AFC media is shipping in volume beginning today in IBM's Travelstar notebook hard disk drive products with data densities up to 25.7 gigabits per square inch. IBM plans to implement AFC media across all of its disk drive product lines. With AFC media, Big Blue says 100-gigabit data density could allow 400 GB desktop drives and 200 GB notebook drives within two years. Apparently, making hard drives bigger is cheaper than making files and applications smaller. It seems like every time disk capacity increases, the application vendors are more than eager to gobble it up.