1.5 TB 2.5 inch laptop HDD drives with 12.5mm, and ≈ 1 TB 9.5 mm SSD drives finally seem to have arrived
Posted by jpluimers on 2013/01/12
Large capacity notebook HDD drives
It appears that finally this kind of laptop HDD drives have arrived:
- 1.5 TB capacity
- 2.5 inch
- 12.5 mm high (fits few standard drive bays, but often fits an adapter for the CD/DVD drive bay)
I’ve hoped for these drives to appear for a long time, and wrote blog posts on it in March 2012 (HDD market seems recovered, and WD introduced 4 TB 3.5 HDDs: when are 2.5 inch 12.5 mm 1.5+ TB drives coming?) and September 2012 (When are the 12.5mm 1.5 TB and 14.8mm 2 TB notebook drives coming?).
Finally they seem to be there, but there is still confusion of model number and exact drive height, so here are some links that I collected with information:
- Apple StackExchange user alkarnur wrote has bought a MQ01ABD150 as listed on OCW: it is 12.5mm and 12.5 mm fits in a MacBook Pro 15.
- PX1830E-1HK0 is claimed by Toshiba to be 9 mm high, but notebookreview user mikebore claims it is 12.5 mm, and it is the same drive as a MQ01ABC150.
- For later this year: Showa Denko Set to Begin Roll-Out Seventh-Generation PMR Platters for High-Capacity HDDs in 2013 – X-bit labs.
- Seagate 2.5″ 1.5TB Ext FreeAgent GoFlex Disassmebly/Removal – YouTube.
The YouTube video indicates the Seagate drive inside the GoFlex is indeed 12.5 mm high, but doesn’t reveal the product number of the drive.
Given the below Toshiba model numbers and specs, my gut feeling is that they are all the same drive (USA pricing currently varies between USD 125 and USD 140):
- MQ01ABC150: Toshiba, 1.5TB, 2.5 inch, 12.5 mm, SATA 3.0 Gb/s, 5400 rpm, 8 MB cache.
- MQ01ABD150: Toshiba, 1.5TB, 2.5 inch, 12.5 mm, SATA 3.0 Gb/s, 5400 rpm, 8 MB cache.
- PX1830E-1HK0: Toshiba, 1.5 TB, 2.5 inch, 9?? mm, SATA 3.0 Gb/s, 5400 rpm, 8 MB cache.
Large capacity notebook SSD drives
In the mean time, the largest capacity of SSD drives available is approximately 1 TB:
- OWC OWCSSDEX3G960 960GB Mercury Electra MAX 3G SSD… in stock at OWC.
It costs around USD 1120. - OCZ Octane SATA III 2.5″ SSD – OCZ.
The 1 TB version – model OCT1-25SAT3-1T – costs around USD 2500.
Not available yet, but announced:
- M500 SSD – Micron Technology, Inc.. Mac capacity: 960 GB
- Mushkin Unveils New Chronos Deluxe 960 GB SSD.
It looks like most (if not all) 960 GB drives internally use some form of RAID 0. The OWC is, and the Mushkin is too, but the M500 might be non-raid (we will know for sure after it ships) as it is supposed to use 128 Gb NAND dies (the OCZ Octane does, but when it got introduced, these were really expensive).
–jeroen
The Wiert Corner - irregular stream of stuff 
Leave a comment