Hard drives just got a lot bigger and smarter thanks to the Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 range. We've just taken receipt of the absolutely ginormous 750GB version and it's a BitTorrent file hoarder's fantasy.
A cool 750GB. That's enough capacity to let you watch movies back to back for three months without seeing the same film twice; to listen to 1.6 years of continuous music without ever hearing the same track; or to store a Word document so long that even if you started reading it at birth, you'd die before you got half way through it.
The secret to the Barracuda 7200.10's size is its perpendicular recording technology. Today's drives store data lengthways across the hard disk platter, but the laws of physics (curse you, Newton!) mean you can't store bits of data any closer together using this technique.
Perpendicular drives solve the problem by storing data perpendicular to the disk platter, so data can be stacked closer together for higher capacities and faster transfer rates. It's a bit like fitting more people onto a bed by making them sleep standing up -- for a better explanation, check this video on the perpendicular technology by Hitachi.
The Barracuda 7200.10 comes in a range of sizes starting from 200GB. The 750GB version is available now for around £320, but we'll put its perpendicular goodness to the test in a full review in our accessories channel shortly. -RR
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