Microdrive
Prior to the 1-inch Microdrive, a 1.3-inch HDD was developed and launched in June of 1992 by HP with a capacity of 20, then later 40 MB. These units weighed about 28 g (1 oz), with dimensions of 2.0" × 1.44" × 0.414" (50.8 mm × 36.5 mm × 10.5 mm) and were the physically smallest hard drives in the world before the Microdrive. In September of 1998, IBM announced the Microdrive. It was advertised as being about the size of a large coin, weighing less than an AA battery, and the capacity of over 200 floppy disks. The Microdrive was expected to be available by mid-1999. In June of 1999, IBM launched the first generation 1-inch Microdrive. It had storage capacities of 170 MB and 340 MB at a price of $499. The physical dimensions of Microdrive were 1.65" × 1.42" × 0.197" (42.0 mm × 36.0 mm × 5.0 mm) and conformed to CompactFlash Type II card standard. A second generation of Microdrive was announced by IBM in June of 2000 with increased capacities at 512 MB and 1 GB, with the 512 MB model costing $399 and the 1 GB model costing $499. Following the merger of IBM and Hitachi HDD business units, Hitachi Global Storage Technologies continued the development and marketing of the Microdrive. In 2003, 2 GB and 4 GB models were announced by Hitachi. The 4 GB model was first available February 20, 2004 for a price of $499. This was followed by a 6 GB capacity model in February of 2005 for a price of $299, with the 4 GB model dropping to $199. Hitachi additionally planned an even smaller 1-inch hard drive with a capacity of 8-10 GB under the code-name "Mikey" for late 2005 with a weight of 14 grams and a size of 40 mm x 30 mm x 5 mm.
By 2007, sales and profit of the Microdrive were dwindling so Hitachi discontinued production of 1 inch hard disk drives. Sales of 1-inch drives were only about 3,000 in a three-month period in 2007, while 560,000 units of 1-1.8-inch drives were sold throughout July to September of 2007. Hitachi wanted to shift over to bigger 2.5 and 3.5-inch hard disk drives, rather than the small hard disk drive business. In 2004, Seagate launched 2.5 and 5 GB hard disk drives in the same small physical form-factor as IBM Microdrive, and referred to them as either 1-inch hard drives or CompactFlash hard drives due to the trademark issue. These drives were also commonly known as the Seagate ST1. In 2005 Seagate launched an 8 GB model. Seagate also sold a standalone consumer product based on these drives with a product known as the Pocket Hard Drive. These devices came in the shape of a hockey puck with an integrated USB 2.0 cable. Seagate launched their 6 GB mini drive on the same day as Hitachi, in February of 2005. In early 2005 Western Digital announced they would be joining the mini hard drive market with their own drives. These would be available by the second half of 2005 and reach capacities up to 6 GB. Western Digital launched a 6 GB external USB 2.0 microdrive as a part of the Passport Pocket brand in March of 2006. This was made as a competitor to the Seagate Pocket Hard Drive. The unit had 2 MB of cache, 11 ms seek, spun at 3,600 RPM, and was 60 x 45 x 9 mm. The price for the unit was $130 upon release. In 2003-07-16, a Chinese manufacturer called GS Magicstor, Inc. (subsidiary of GS Magic, Inc.) announced it had produced 1-inch hard disk drive with capacity of 2.4GB at the beginning of the year 2003, originally marketed as an alternative to Microdrive by Hitachi Global Storage Technologies. It was to be followed by 2.2 and 4.8GB 1-inch HDD that was unveiled in 2004 International CES, with 0.8-inch HDD. In 2004-12-28, Hitachi Global Storage Technologies announced it had filed lawsuit against GS Magicstor, Inc., GS Magic, Inc., and Riospring, Inc. for infringement of multiple Hitachi GST's patents relating to hard disk drives, after GS Magic Inc. had started promoting mini-HDD (small form factor hard disk drive). As of July 2012, there are no known manufacturers of 1-inch form-factor harddisk drives. Hitachi had also stopped production of its trademarked Microdrive product. Date of release of large sizes. Several physical examples of Microdrives are held by the Computer History Museum. "IBM and Hitachi models were fitted with 128 KB of cache memory. " "These Seagate models were fitted with 2 MB of cache memory. "
History ; Seagate
Microdrive is a registered trademark for miniature, 1-inch hard disks produced by IBM and Hitachi.