Seagate to stop making 7200 RPM drives for notebooks
Though there are hardly any hard disc drive manufacturers left, Seagate remains one of the largest. Helping the company get where it is today were acquisitions of industry giants like Maxtor and, more recently, Samsung’s HDD division.
The Cupertino-based company introduced the industry’s first 7,200 RPM disc drive back in the early 90’s. But oddly enough the company was a late bloomer when it came to 2.5-inch drives for laptops, only entering the market ten years ago. Finally, nearly three years ago Seagate introduced the Momentus XT solid state hybrid drive for notebooks.
Apparently Seagate is now planning to discontinue 2.5-inch 7,200 RPM drives for notebooks, in favor of hybrid drives.
“We are going stop building our notebook 7200 RPM hard disc drives at the end of 2013,” said David Burks, director of marketing and product management at Seagate Technology, during a conversation with X-bit labs.
5,400 RPM drives will continue shipping in budget notebooks and also be paired with SSDs in high-end solutions. Seagate also plans to introduce its 3rd generation hybrid drives later this year.