Toshiba has just announced that it will be releasing the industry’s highest-capacity series of SATA 1.8″ hard drives, bringing 5,400 RPM performance in single-platter 80GB and dual-platter 160GB models. These new hard drives are meant to deliver market-leading capacity, high-performance and durability in a diminutive package, targeting space-efficient mobile PC systems. Guess well will see more mini notebooks and other such portable media players with larger capacities without a huge bump in price sometime in the near future thanks to Toshiba.

The storage capacities offered by the 160GB MK1617GSG and 80GB MK8017GSG mirror those of larger form factor HDDs, while reducing the storage footprint by nearly 40 percent compared with the 2.5-inch form factor. Combined with the new micro-SATA connector, Serial-ATA 1.5Gb/s interface and 5,400 RPM spin speed, the MKxx17GSG series offers small and light-weight solutions at increased data transfer rates for enhanced performance in sub-notebook PCs. To develop these products, Toshiba applied an extensible platform approach that features a shared architecture base with the company’s landmark 2.5-inch HDD product line, ensuring cross-platform compatibility. This approach allows the new 1.8-inch HDDs to leverage proven technologies, as well as certified compliance to the Serial-ATA 2.6 specification.

How do you see this release affect the gadget and computer world? Which are the gadgets that you would like to see most featuring a larger capacity? Do you think a hard drive based iPhone is a viable idea, compared to just using (relatively) more expensive flash memory inside? Well, just mark August 2008 in your calendars if you’re looking forward to these new Toshiba hard drives as both the 80GB and 160GB models will ship to PC manufacturers and distribution partners then. Maybe those China-made portable media players will put up more a fight now by including hard drives instead of being capped at a measly 4GB memory.

Press Release