Toshiba has expanded its line of 1.8-inch hard drives today with a new dual-platter model that can hold up to 320GB of data -- a world's first in this form factor. The MK3233GSG features a 3Gbps SATA interface and 16MB cache buffer, produces just 19dB of noise during seeks and spins at 5,400 rpm for a maximum transfer rate of 830Mb/s.

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Well seems ok , not a monster though , but decent ;) Hehe but since there no pricing we can't tell at the moment sadly :D

Small size factor and low power consumption make it an ideal hard-drive for netbooks (less heat, more battery time, less noise). I can already see the next generation netbooks with 15+ hours battery time. Better yet, you might even be able to replace the 2.5 inch HDD from your own netbook with a 1.8 inch one (with a liitle extra effort of course :) ).

Some will say that it will improve battery life for notebooks also, but I don't think that's the case. In notebooks the HDD is the lesser consummer, compared to the CPU and GPU, so the 42% less power when seeking will maybe get you around 5-10 minutes of extra battery time.

Hope they will not be priced much higher than the 2.5 inch.

Wow, 320GB in such a tiny hard drive! Also saw that Western Digital is coming out with a 640GB 2.5" hard drive soon.

This is great because a lot of people are switching to laptops instead of desktops now, and with all the multimedia content people use these days, large hard drives are a must. Who will be the first to offer 1TB in a 2.5" form factor? :)

Wow, that's not bad for such a tiny HDD.... But my laptop holds two 2.5in HDDs so I'm good! :D

I wonder how many laptops out there which actually use 1.8in drives? And wouldn't it be a better idea for Toshiba and other hard drive makers to concentrate on making affordable SSDs rather than trying to make smaller magnetic hard drives - surely their days are numbered.

Lots of devices use the 1.8 inch drives... not too many computers... but the smaller IBM and Lenovo.

Now Toshiba needs to get its act together and design some Solid State drives that are large enough and fast enough to retain their market share.
Over time, we have not seen a more reliable drive, with Seagate and WD closes seconds, but IDE and SATA drives are now old hat. They will be hard to find in three years... maybe less.

it's nice to see small drives are getting bigger and bigger. This would come very useful for those small portable devices.

The Technology Mantra: Smaller and better.

Price will be insane I bet.. and realistically SSD's will slaughter this in the very near future.

@slh28 and @Anasazi: You don't find 1.8 inch drives in laptops because most of the models have only 4200 rpm. These new drives have the same speed as 2.5 inch ones, plus they use less power and make less noise.

SSDs still have a long way to go before they reach the right $/GB and realiability to replace mechanical drives for good (@Anasazi: more than three years anyway).

For its size...wow! Imagine in the future our cellphones will have more memory than us! lol

Something like this as an external hard drive would be awesome for portable storage.

Transfer speeds would still max out a USB 2 connection, but not an eSATA or USB 3.

This smells like new notebooks and netbooks generations, umpcs will be on peak.

Now we can get a 320gb ipod classic for people who need to carry their favorite 80,000 songs with them.

The capacity, very small form factor, and the insane shock resistance, recommend this drive for a very portable usb storage device. Also because of the sustainable 830Mbit/s rate it could be used with ease in netbooks, and small factor tablets.

Wow, I did not even know that 1.8's go that high. It has been only few weeks ago that 2.5's hit 640GB. But how fast is it?

That is good news. My laptop has 1.8" drive which works at 4500RPM respectively very low data transfer. In general my laptop has very good characteristics, but this little thing trip up the whole system. I hope that soon 1.8" drives will reach the speed of 2.5" drives.

I bought it yesterday from bestbuy, but it shows only 298 gb. Can anyone tell me why is it?

I just bought one of these yesterday and have the same question you did. Have you been able to find out why it only shows 298 gb?