IBM Corp has announced what it bills as the world’s highest capacity desktop PC disk drive – employing a new technology called Giant Magnetoresistive (GMR) heads. The IBM-developed GMR heads will be used in the Deskstar 16GP, a 16.8-gigabyte drive – about eight times more capacity than today’s average desktop hard drive. Big Blue boasts that the new drive can hold 8 hours of full-motion video (MPEG-2 quality video). The pin-sized GMR head creates a high sensitivity that IBM figures can, within four years, mean drives with more than 10 billion bits per square inch on the platter. For higher performance, IBM has also announced a 7,200 RPM 14.4-gigabyte Deskstar 14GXP desktop drive. Users who choose the 14GXP drive family can get a choice of three different capacities ranging from 10.1 to 14.4 gigabytes. The company’s 5,400 RPM Deskstar 16GP drive family, includes seven different capacities, from 3.2 to 16.8 gigabytes. The new GMR drives are expected to be available in December. Last month, IBM announced what it claimed was the highest capacity disk drive available for notebook computers, the 8.1Gb Travelstar 8 GS (CI No 3,274).
