Hitachi TravelStar 5K80 - 80 GB : Nine Notebook Hard Drives Make Their Debuts

Hitachi TravelStar 5K80 - 80 GB

By Patrick Schmid, published on December 13, 2004
Source: Tom's Guide US | Keywords: nine, notebook, hard, drives, make, their, debuts | Themes: Business Notebooks

Contents

4. Hitachi TravelStar 5K80 - 80 GB

Hitachi started the notebook drive assault with their TravelStar 7K60 at 7,200 RPM and has now added a model running at 5,400 RPM to their portfolio. The Japanese company wants to offer a suitable drive for all possible applications.

The TravelStar 5K80 is available in 20, 40, 60 and 80 GB capacities, with a per-platter capacity of 40 GB. The successor to this drive, the TravelStar 5K100, is due to arrive soon, to battle the Fujitsu MHU2100AT and Toshiba's MK1031GAS.

The 5K80 is only slightly slower in access time than Seagate's Momentus 5400.2, but considerably slower than its in-house competitor, the TravelStar 7K60. When compared to other 5,400 RPM drives, the Hitachi leaves quite a good impression, and is able to maintain a nice position in all benchmarks. In terms of interface performance, Hitachi did a good job with both models, and even though the 5K100 is almost ready, the 5K80 can still be recommended.