To anyone concerned, I sent a similar comment to Other World Computing and received this helpful information about current and future availability of ATA mobile drives for PowerPC laptops:
As for IDE/ATA 2.5” 7200RPM – we’re reaching a point when there will be NO IDE/ATA 2.5” being produced. The HD MFRs don’t have a large enough forward demand and Hitachi, Samsung, Toshiba, and Fujitsu exited about 12 months ago. Seagate stopped producing several months ago and pretty much at end of the line once supplies run out. WD stayed in and really would only be there as the only one in or volume wouldn’t work at all for them. We’ve pleaded our case some time ago to our reps and unless we’re buying a million drives (yikes) the market itself doesn’t have the demand to spin units up.
That said – the 5400RPM 320GB, from Western Digital, is actually faster than the fastest 7200RPM 2.5” drives made for IDE/ATA. While not spinning at 7200RPM, they still provide data rates 30-50% higher than those 7200RPM due to the the higher density of data on the platters as well as other improvements.
So – you can bump up your capacity and your performance with a drive that will also run cooler and use less power too.
Let me know if this helps / any questions, etc.
[quote|cleargraphics]To anyone concerned, I sent a similar comment to Other World Computing and received this helpful information about current and future availability of ATA mobile drives for PowerPC laptops:
As for IDE/ATA 2.5” 7200RPM – we’re reaching a point when there will be NO IDE/ATA 2.5” being produced. The HD MFRs don’t have a large enough forward demand and Hitachi, Samsung, Toshiba, and Fujitsu exited about 12 months ago. Seagate stopped producing several months ago and pretty much at end of the line once supplies run out. WD stayed in and really would only be there as the only one in or volume wouldn’t work at all for them. We’ve pleaded our case some time ago to our reps and unless we’re buying a million drives (yikes) the market itself doesn’t have the demand to spin units up.
That said – the 5400RPM 320GB, from Western Digital, is actually faster than the fastest 7200RPM 2.5” drives made for IDE/ATA. While not spinning at 7200RPM, they still provide data rates 30-50% higher than those 7200RPM due to the the higher density of data on the platters as well as other improvements.
So – you can bump up your capacity and your performance with a drive that will also run cooler and use less power too.
Let me know if this helps / any questions, etc.[/quote]
