Computex 2006 - Taipei : Toshiba 200GB 2.5in HDD goes into production August

[Bob Crabtree]

Toshiba has turned to perpendicular recording technology to increase the capacity of 2.5in laptop hard disk drives to 200GB (unformatted). The company is showing its new "best of class" 200GB drive, the MK2035GSS, on its stand (B624) at this week's Computex Taipei show and plans to go into production in August.

More in this HEXUS.headline, including full specs.

[Mike Fishcake]

do SATA notebook HDDs have the same connectors as 3.5 drives?

[Bob Crabtree]

Never seen one, but I can't think there's any chance that the connectors will be the same as on a full-size SATA HDD.

[arthurleung]

By the look of it it looks like its the same as 3.5" drive though.

[Bob Crabtree]

Nothing I can find on Toshiba's site clarifies this - the 200GB model would appear to be its first SATA offering.

However, you might find this PDF (900KB-plus) about Hitachi's likkle SATA HDD useful, in as much as it has measurements and diagrams (page 29).

[chrestomanci]

Originally Posted by Bob Crabtree

However, you might find this PDF (900KB-plus) about Hitachi's likkle SATA HDD useful, in as much as it has measurements and diagrams (page 29).

There is a better diagram on page 35 of that PDF.

The connection does look very much like desktop SATA. It is possible that the voltages are different but I doubt it.

I think the SATA standards commitee would have been fools not to make desktop & notbook drives the same when the standards where set, after all, the difference on PATA, must have caused no end of problems over the years for no good reason.

[Bob Crabtree]

Well spotted.

My original thoughts were that they wouldn't put standard SATA fittings on these laptop drives because they're considerably bulkier than the fittings that you find on PATA drives and, therefore, likely to cause problems in terms of the space required within a laptop.

But, now I'm thinking that if they are indeed using standard SATA fittings, how common it will be for the cabling to come undone?

The old PATA stuff was a bid fiddly but made a very positive fit - and a positive fit isn't one of the features for which SATA cabling is best known.

[chrestomanci]

Originally Posted by Bob Crabtree

But, now I'm thinking that if they are indeed using standard SATA fittings, how common it will be for the cabling to come undone?

The old PATA stuff was a bid fiddly but made a very positive fit - and a positive fit isn't one of the features for which SATA cabling is best known.

Laptop drives are virtualy plugged into the motherboad, so I would guess that the connectors would be soldered onto the motherboard, and then the laptop plugged into them, and screwed down. Unlike a desktop system there would be no slack cable to pull out.

[Bob Crabtree]

I know what you mean but most of the laptop drives I've seen in situ have been mounted in caddies and then that caddy attaches to the PC - so it will be interesting to see how these SATA drives are connected and mounted in laptops.