Toshiba launches its all new 2.5-inch HDD with high data security

The HDD (Hard Disk Drive) market is up and thriving. As a statistical record says, worldwide revenue from shipments of HDDs was at an all time record of more than $27 billion in 2010 (which was around 674.6 million units sold). Now, Toshiba comes in this propitious phase to launch there all new and advanced 2.5-inch HDD with high data security. It is touted to automatically invalidate all data when connected to an unknown machine.

toshiba self encripting hard drives

Utilizing Toshiba's very own data encryption technology "wipe technology," the HDD is aimed at PCs, multifunctional digital machines used at companies and public offices and also POS machines for sales outlets. The data itself is encrypted with 256-bit AES encryption. This is how it works: the host machine (through the user we presume) supplies an authentication code to the HDD. If the authentication procedure between this machine and the HDD fails, the HDD deletes its encryption key, thereby invalidating the whole data stored on it.

Toshiba has provided convenient alternatives, like it would be possible to read the data on the "master" computer after it's been invalidated by an unknown computer. And, there are also choices of invalidating the data in the owner computer itself, and even when the power is cut off.

The specifications of this 2.5 inch HDD are as follows - it comes in storage capacities of 640, 500, 320, 250 and 160 gigabytes. It measures 69.85 x 100.00 x 9.5mm. The weights of the 640- and 500-gigabyte models are 115g, and those of the other models are 98g. Its average seek time and rotation speed are 12ms and 7,200rpm, respectively, whereas the encryption and decryption speeds of the HDD are 3.0Gbps. The power consumption is 2.3W for seeking and 2.1W for writing and reading data. Toshiba already plans to make its first sample shipment as early as June.

Via: Techon