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     This story was printed from CdrInfo.com,

     located at http://www.cdrinfo.com.

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Seagate today announced the Barracuda 7200.7 and the Barracuda 7200.7 Plus disc drives for PCs. Using advanced head and media technology to achieve 80-Gbytes-per-disc, the new drives add storage capacity of up to 160 Gbytes to Seagate's popular Barracuda hard drive family. The new models will offer the choice of a native Serial ATA interface or a Parallel ATA interface. The Barracuda 7200.7 Plus has a standard onboard cache of 8 Mbytes and capacities of 160GB and 120GB, while the Barracuda 7200.7 offers cache of 2 Mbytes on 160GB, 120GB, 80GB and 40GB models. Seagate's patented SoftSonic(tm) Fluid Dynamic Bearing (FDB) motor makes the Barracuda the quietest PC hard drive on the market.

The Barracuda 7200.7 product family is designed for today's business PCs, home entertainment PCs, entry-level ATA servers and Network-Attached Storage (NAS).

Seagate is shipping Serial ATA drives today, and the Barracuda 7200.7 extends the technology delivered by its predecessor, the Barracuda ATA V. Serial ATA is a faster, simpler, more intelligent interface technology designed to replace Parallel ATA as the PC and consumer electronics storage interface standard. Seagate's native Serial ATA technology contains no translator bridges to reduce performance. Serial ATA provides the industry with a clear path to continued storage growth, data integrity and ease of integration.

The Barracuda 7200.7 hard drive's durable design resists up to 350 Gs non-operating shock. A number of new design improvements enable the Barracuda to continue Seagate's industry-leading ruggedness. Fewer, smaller and lower-profile PCB components protect against handling damage. The PCB itself is now recessed to reduce the risk of handling damage. A recessed motor housing and connector with protective nub also shield against handling damage. And the drive's chip set is more integrated than ever, with just a single chip dedicated to both read-channel and interface functions.

Seagate also announced the new Barracuda 5400.1 hard drive to meet the new requirements of System Integrators designing cost-sensitive products. Barracuda 5400.1 combines many advanced features and the well-known reliability of Seagate's Barracuda and U Series product families. It offers a value-focused, single-head configuration with a 40-Gbyte capacity and a 5400-rpm performance level. It's 25-percent thinner than a traditional PC drive to improve system airflow-so it can be employed in fanless systems, which are more attractive to consumers and less expensive to design and build. And it sports Seagate's patented SoftSonic fluid dynamic bearing motors for low acoustics - only 2.6 bels during idle. Barracuda 5400.1 is designed for applications that require low cost, high reliability, low acoustics, and the popular 40-Gbyte capacity sweet spot: office computers and entry-level PCs, mainstream PVRs, game consoles and audio jukeboxes, and other non-traditional markets like ATMs, security cameras, printers and Karaoke machines.

The new Barracuda products also feature Seagate's 3D Defense System to protect users' information from common problems. The exclusive 3D Defense System - Drive Defense, Data Defense and Diagnostic Defense - has helped customers by improving long-term reliability and reducing returns due to handling damage.