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View Full Version : Hitachi-LG HyDrive Combines SSD with Optical Drives


Reid Kistler
06-04-2010, 01:00 AM
<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.engadget.com/2010/05/31/hitachi-lg-goes-official-with-hydrive-ssd-equipped-optical-driv/' target='_blank'>http://www.engadget.com/2010/05/31/...d-optical-driv/</a><br /><br /></div><p><em>"Put simply, the HyDrive is a standard form factor optical drive (DVD burner or Blu-ray will be available), but there's a 32GB or 64GB SSD... tucked below. When this gets stuffed within a laptop, you're immediately able to access an optical drive, an SSD (for your operating system and critical launch applications) and a spacious HDD...."</em></p><p><img src="http://images.thoughtsmedia.com/resizer/thumbs/size/600/dht/auto/1275607299.usr19541.jpg" style="border: 1px solid #d2d2bb;" /></p><p>Image Credit: <a href="http://www.engadget.com/photos/hitachi-lg-hydrive-hands-on-at-computex-2010/#3026141" target="_blank">Engadget</a></p><p>I am not certain that a 32GB - or even a 64GB - hard drive could really be considered as "spacious" these days, but this does seem like an obvious pairing of technologies, especially for the laptop market. Hitachi-LG is a joint venture that specializes in OEM products (no direct sales to consumers), and the first HyDrive equipped laptops are not expected until August 2010.&nbsp; Read the full article on Engadget for additional details, including a link to the official press release, which promises some enticing benefits for the current design, along with faster units, with greater storage, by mid-2011.</p><p><em></em></p>

follick
06-04-2010, 05:15 PM
The spacious HDD they are referring to is the laptop's original regular HDD. With this product you wouldn't have to choose between a larger mechanical HDD and a smaller SSD in a laptop. Since the SSD is built into the optical disk you can have both. This is a setup similar to what you can more easily do in a desktop. Have a small SSD as a boot drive and a large HDD for media storage.

Jason Dunn
06-04-2010, 05:29 PM
Have a small SSD as a boot drive and a large HDD for media storage.

It's good in theory, but SSDs are still pretty expensive - maybe by the end of 2010 we'll see 64 GB SSDs for pretty cheap and having one as a boot drive in a laptop will be cost-effective. Although given the way every app out there defaults to the C: drive for install, data storage, etc., I don't think dual-drive setups will be very user-friendly. Maybe the big OEMs can do something smart and come up with Windows system images that move all the user data storage folders to the hard drive...