Showa Denko K.K. (SDK) has started commercial shipments of 2.5-inch hard disk (HD) media with storage capacity of 334 gigabytes per disk, using the fifth-generation perpendicular magnetic recording (PMR) technology.

The company's new 2.5-inch HD media have the world?s highest storage capacity for this size available on the market today. SDK has already commercialized 1.89-, 2.5-, and 3.5-inch fourth-generation PMR media.

Compared with the conventional technology that stores magnetic data on a horizontal plane of the HD media, the PMR technology enables vertical magnetic recording, resulting in a dramatic increase in recording density.

Demand for high-capacity HD media is growing for such applications as PCs that enable storage/editing of moving pictures as well as HDD recorders that can record high-definition TV programs. SDK has established a setup for ensuring speedy and stable deliveries of high-capacity HD media based on the PMR technology.