Seagate may sue

Business magazine Fortune recently talked to Seagate CEO Bill Watkins about his feeling toward the new trend of ultra-portable laptops carrying solid state disks (SDD), says TechSpot.com.

Watkins feels there is no real threat for the traditional hard drive because he believes people will realise there is no valid justification for paying much more for so much less storage space.

Watkins also mentioned that if SSDs someday become popular enough to threaten the hard disk drive business, he is ready to play the lawsuit card. Watkins believes SSD makers and boosters like Intel and Samsung violate patents they hold regarding the way storage devices communicate with computers.

According to the latest "IDC Worldwide Disk Storage Systems Quarterly Tracker" report, worldwide external disk storage systems revenue in the fourth quarter of 2007 increased 9.8% year-over-year, topping $5.3 billion, says e-Channel Line.

Total disk storage systems revenue increased 7.6% year-over-year to $7.5 billion, with a total capacity shipped reaching 1 645 petabytes, which was a 56.3% year-over-year growth compared to the fourth quarter of 2006.

"The disk storage systems market exited 2007 strong, indicating that data storage remains a crucial component to the successful execution of enterprise business," said Brad Nisbet, research manager at IDC, in a statement.

Atrato, a storage start-up, is debuting a self-maintaining array of independent disks for the cable-TV operator and government security markets, says EE Times.

Atrato debuted as Sherwood Information Systems, designing a new storage array that allows multiple video streams to be accessed from a 3U platform.

The company's systems begin with entry-level 10TB arrays, but its 50TB system is seen as a sweet spot for cable operators.