When booting a PC, timing is important. Well, at least to most people it can be. And with this latest innovation from Samsung, you could find yourself gaining about 25 seconds!

Imagine a Windows laptop that could boot up as much as 25 seconds more quickly than usual, last up to 30 minutes longer on battery power, and be as much as five times more reliable than existing PCs. That is Samsung’s vision for the value of its new Hybrid Hard Drive (HHD), a next-generation drive that combines flash memory with traditional rotating magnetic storage.

The company announced the drive on Wednesday and will be showing it at the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference in Seattle, Washington, next week.

The magnetic storage part of the drive will provide the high storage densities found in standard hard-drive technology, while the flash part of the drive will provide the reliability, the fast read-write access, and the low power consumption, Samsung said.

Vista Coordination

When flash memory is being used, the hard drive remains idle which, according to Samsung, can save battery power and make the drive less susceptible to damage. The hard drive spins to “flush out” memory a few times every 10 to 20 minutes, then returns to its idle state unless it is needed.

Microsoft sees the product as complementing the upcoming Windows Vista operating system.

“Hybrid hard disks and Windows ReadyDrive Technology are integrated advancements that improve the performance and reliability of computers using Windows Vista, especially notebook computers,” said Mike Sievert, Microsoft’s corporate vice president in the Windows Client Marketing division, in a statement.

It is expected that the hybrid drives will be marketed under the ReadyDrive brand name and released in coordination with Vista’s rollout….. Source: NewsFactorNetwork