Quantcast
Subscribe to magazine

Living-Room Hard Drives

Hitachi's new My Library Video Edition and similar devices vie for a place in your home entertainment setup.

Alan Stafford, PC World

  • 0 Yes
  • 0 No

Hitachi's Cinemastar Series, Seagate's DB35 Series, and Western Digital's new My Library Video Edition are part of a wave of hard drives meant for living-room entertainment devices. "Access time and speed aren't important factors [with video]," says Western Digital's Cathy Scott. The $200, 500GB My Library Video Edition uses a fast eSATA connection but has a slow seek time so that it delivers data just in time, thereby reducing power consumption and noise. Its Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF) rate of 1 million hours is higher than that of WD's desktop drives, though Scott won't say how much higher.

The My Library Video Edition works only with Scientific Atlanta 8300 series DVRs, but Scott says to "stay tuned" for other compatible devices. One candidate is the new TiVo HD, which has an eSATA port. Unfortunately, TiVo hasn't enabled it yet.

For our appraisals of external hard drives evaluated by the PC World Test Center, see Top 5 External Hard Drives.

  • Recommend this story?
  • 0 Yes
    0 No

"Living-Room Hard Drives" Comments

Print 65% more pages than with refilled inks. Trust Original HP Inks. Hit Print Reliably.

Featured APC Accessories For Your System
10% Off Entire Cart at Online Store

  • APC Back-UPS ES Safeguards your equipment from damaging surges and spikes that travel along your utility & data lines.
  • APC SurgeArrest Performance Highest level of protection for your professional computers, electronics and connected devices, as well as provides surge protection.

People who read this also read:

  • 2007 Microsoft Office Suites Comparison This paper compares and contrasts four suites of the 2007 Microsoft Office system: Microsoft Office Standard 2007, Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2007, Microsoft Office Enterprise 2007 and Microsoft Office Ultimate 2007. This paper is intended to help organizations understand the applications and capabilities offered, and to identify the suite that best fits their needs.
  • Windows Vista Migration: The Business Proposition It's not so much a matter of "if" but "when" for most organizations regarding migration to Windows Vista. Laying the groundwork now for this migration can yield higher ROI than waiting until later. This Computerworld Technology Briefing explains it all.

PC World's Marketplace