INTRODUCTION

   M.2 PCIe 3.0/4.0 solid state drives may hold the title of the fastest storage media around currently but in terms of capacity nothing can compare the classic hard disk drives. Now as some of you are aware a couple of years ago, we predicted that by the end of 2020 Seagate, WD and Toshiba would all have 20TB models in the market (some even 22TB ones) and so when WD announced early sampling of their 18-20TB models last September our prediction came true. Still WD is the only one of these three manufacturers to announce sampling of 18-20TB drives since the highest capacity models by both Seagate and Toshiba are currently 16TB ones (at least officially). Toshiba was actually the last manufacturer to announce availability of 14-16TB capacity models and today with us we have their high-performance desktop mode, the X300 14TB.

   Toshiba Electronics Europe GmbH (TEE) is the European electronic components business of Toshiba Electronic Devices and Storage Corporation. TEE offers a broad IC and discrete product line including high-end memory, microcontrollers, ASICs and ASSPs for automotive, multimedia, industrial, telecoms and networking applications. The company also has a wide range of power semiconductor solutions as well as storage products including HDDs, SSDs, SD Cards and USB sticks. TEE was formed in 1973 in Neuss, Germany, providing design, manufacturing, marketing and sales and now has headquarters in Dusseldorf, Germany, with branch offices in France, Italy, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom. TEE employs approximately 300 people in Europe. Company president is Mr. Akira Morinaga.

   The X300 family of SATA III 3.5" hard disk drives is currently available in 4/5/6/8/10/12/14/16TB capacities with the 12/14/16TB models using helium instead of air for reduced friction which in turn results in reduced noise levels, power consumption and temperatures (the 14TB variant which we have here today is probably based on an 8 platter design, 1.8TB in capacity each). There are of course other differences between models so even though the 4/5/6/8TB models feature a total of 128MB cache the 10/12/14TB models have twice as much (256MB) and the same applies for the top of the line 16TB model which has a total of 512MB. Everything else however remains the same so the entire X300 line features 7200RPM models with perpendicular magnetic recording (PMR), NCQ (native command queuing), ramp loading technology (improves reliability), stable platter technology (minimizes vibrations), internal shock sensors and dual stage actuators (offer increased performance, data integrity and overall drive reliability). Finally, Toshiba covers the entire X300 family of hard disk drives with a 2 year limited warranty and currently reports an MTTF (mean time to failure) of 600 thousand hours for entire line.