Seagate GoFlex Mac & Thin @ CES 2011
by Anand Lal Shimpi on January 10, 2011 2:33 PM EST- Posted in
- Storage
- Seagate
- HDDs
- GoFlex Desk
- CES 2011
I met with Seagate briefly at the show and it gave me an update on additions to its drive lineup. Unfortunately there still are no updates to the Momentus XT. It remains as the only Hybrid HDD in Seagate’s lineup. I’m disappointed as I was hoping to at least see one update to the drive by now. As you may remember from our review the Momentus XT is easily the fastest desktop HDD on the market in real world usage, although it still can’t compete with SSDs.
The GoFlex Desk I reviewed not too long ago is officially coming to the Mac platform and Apple stores with the GoFlex Desk for Mac. There are only two differences between this version and what I reviewed. The first is the color of the chassis, the Mac version is a Mac-like silver vs. the standard black. The second difference is the drive will come formatted with a HFS+ partition, allowing Mac users to use it with Time Machine.
Unfortunately the GoFlex Desk for Mac will sell at a premium compared to the standard GoFlex Desk. Seagate doesn’t appear to have done anything to address the thermal issues I brought up in the 3TB review either.
The GoFlex Desk for Mac will ship with both USB 2.0 and FireWire interfaces.
Seagate GoFlex Thin
Shipping in April of this year Seagate also announced its GoFlex Thin external drive at the show. The GoFlex Thin is a 9mm housing for an internal 7mm 2.5” hard drive. The GoFlex Thin uses a standard GoFlex connector so you can expect a multitude of interface options. The drive will ship with USB 3 by default.
Also in April we’ll see a HFS+ formatted Mac version.
Speaking of the GoFlex connector, Seagate decided to open up the GoFlex connector spec for other manufacturers to use and implement at no cost. Seagate is hoping manufacturers will jump on board and embrace the connector so we can have interoperable, easy plug, external drives and docks. The idea would be to put GoFlex connectors on everything from DVRs to external hard drive docks. Obviously for this to work we’ll need all of the HDD makers on board as well. Seagate claims we’ll see a pledge of support from one other HDD maker, although I suspect it’s not Western Digital.
Special thanks to Venya for helping with the photos for this article
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vol7ron - Monday, January 10, 2011 - link
Is Seagate doing anything these days?It seems like they are prepared to fail.
Hrel - Tuesday, January 11, 2011 - link
You're an idiot; they're one of the top storage providers on the planet.name99 - Saturday, January 22, 2011 - link
The two are not incompatible. The point is not how much storage Seagate make, it is how much PROFIT do they make, and what sort of future growth path they have.Seagate has long given the impression of a company that believes it's at the end of its run, and the future consists of milking the existing market rather than seeking new markets. Rather than embracing the future --- flash drives and lower power, they are offering gimmicks like goflex, custom colors, and superthin drives.
I don't want to sound like an anti-design twit here. Custom colors and thin drives are nice. But they don't separate Seagate from the pack.
Seagate COULD, for example, years ago have made a commitment that a user could trust its drives would always run cool and quiet. You might be paying a little more, but you're getting a guarantee in return. But they didn't do that, and now it's too late --- they charge a premium for their drives, but with no guarantee worth speaking of.
Likewise they COULD have shipped a hybrid drive whose algorithms were not garbage designed by morons. But they didn't, and now their brand is also worth nothing in that space.
They COULD have defined their business as being the storage space, rather than the hard drive space, and ridden the flash train. But they had no vision there either.
Basically they strike me as a dinosaur company. They have a few more years to make money, but in ten years, when we're buying 2TB SSDs from OCZ and Intel and Patriot, what's Seagate's business model?
[Of course much the same holds for Western Digital. They've been no more visionary in their rejection of flash, though at least they're somewhat more realistic about their role in the market ---- they at least understand that they are selling a commodity at commodity prices, and with nothing to differentiate them. Thus no nonsense with something like goflex, and a much more realistic pricing attitude to their USB3 drives.]
Hrel - Tuesday, January 11, 2011 - link
"It's the fastest hard drive for the desktop"??? What? I looked yesterday and only found 2.5" hybrid drives. I was under the impression there are no 3.5" hybrid hard drives; if there are I can't find them anywhere. Please clarify.Also, I agree, I'd like to see an update to the Momentus XT line in 2.5" and I'd like to see hybrid hdd's released for the desktop. Preferably with 8-12GB of SSD on the hard drive instead of the 4 they used on the laptop version.
bhougha10 - Monday, January 24, 2011 - link
I know this is not the place to place this, but ... :(Anandtech, you need to do an artical on the G3. I can't find any definate information on when the thing is comming out. It said Feb. I am expecting Feb to come and this thing will come out and prices will drop big time. I can then get a 120 gb G2 for 150 bucks. some sort of update would be nice, telling use if we should wait or go ahead and just get a 120 or something. Is the wait worth it or not. The forums don't seem to know anything, I'm wondering if you team would have more insight or not.
thx