Science Fiction
Dictionary
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
 |
Toshiba 0.85 Inch Diameter Hard Drive
Toshiba has developed a "nickel disk", a hard drive that is only 0.85 inches in diameter. The new form factor will be used for storage in portable devices like cell phones. It is estimated that they will store up to 4 gigabytes of information.
Update: Guiness World Records announced on March 16th that the Toshiba Drive is the smallest in the world. The 0.85-inch HDDs will start mass production at the end of the year. (Thanks to CNN - Guiness Record for the world's smallest hard disk drive via Slashdot for the tip.)
Photo from Zdnet Japan; reference story here.
The current record-holder is a one-inch diameter hard disk made by Hitachi; but save your old one-inch disks, the nickel disks won't be ready for mass production until 2005.
Science fiction fans may recall the dime disk mentioned in Larry Niven's 1998 story Madness Has Its Place. The new Toshiba 0.85 inch hard drive is not quite dime-sized; the current size of the US dime of 0.7 inches (17.9 mm) was established in 1837. The nickel is 21.2 mm in diameter, or .83 inches. The Toshiba 0.85 inch hard drive is therefore a "nickel disk" - but that's pretty darn close to what Niven had in mind.
Scroll down for more stories in the same category. (Story submitted 12/18/2003)
Follow this kind of news @Technovelgy.| Email | RSS | Blog It | Stumble | del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit |
Would
you like to contribute a story tip?
It's easy:
Get the URL of the story, and the related sf author, and add
it here.
Comment/Join discussion ( 0 )
Related News Stories - (" Data Storage ")
Lonestar Offers Lunar Storage For Ultimate In Security
'Scarif, the off-site backup of all the secret knowledge of the Empire'
100X Improvement In DNA Information Storage
'A record that wouldn't get lost and couldn't be destroyed.' Barbara Hambly, 1982.
Twist Bioscience High Density Digital Data On DNA
'They tied the memory to the bloodline and that was their record!' - Barbara Humbly, 1982.
Store One Bit On One Atom
'...each individual molecule has a meaning.' - Robert Heinlein, 1951.
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
Science Fiction
Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's 1950's
1960's 1970's
1980's 1990's
2000's 2010's
Current News
Bone-Building Drug Evenity Approved
'Compounds devised by the biochemists for the rapid building of bone...'
Secret Kill Switch Found In Yutong Buses
'The car faltered as the external command came to brake...'
Inmotion Electric Unicycle In Combat
'It is about the size and shape of a kitchen stool, gyro-stabilized...'
Grok Scores Best In Psychological Tests
'Try to find out how he ticks...'
PaXini Supersensitive Robot Fingers
'My fingers are not that sensitive...'
Congress Considers Automatic Emergency Braking, One Hundred Years Too Late
'The greatest problem of all was the elimination of the human element of braking together with its inevitable time lag.'
The Desert Ship Sailed In Imagination
'Across the ancient sea floor a dozen tall, blue-sailed Martian sand ships floated, like blue smoke.'
The Zapata Air Scooter Would Be Great In A Science Fiction Story
'Betty's slapdash style.'
Thermostabilized Wet Meat Product (NASA Prototype)
There are no orbiting Michelin stars. Yet.
Could Crystal Batteries Generate Power For Centuries?
'Power could be compressed thus into an inch-square cube of what looked like blue-white ice'
India Ponders Always-On Smartphone Location Tracking
'It is necessary... for your own protection.'
Amazon Will Send You Heinlein's Knockdown Cabin
'It's so light that you can set it up in five minutes by yourself...'
Is It Time To Forbid Human Driving?
'Heavy penalties... were to be applied to any one found driving manually-controlled machines.'
Replace The Smartphone With A Connected Edge Node For AI Inference
'Buy a Little Dingbat... electropen, wrist watch, pocketphone, pocket radio, billfold ... all in one.'
Artificial Skin For Robots Is Coming Right Along
'... an elastic, tinted material that had all the feel and appearance of human flesh and epidermis.'
Robot Guard Dog On Duty
I might also be thinking of K-9 from Doctor Who.
