Hard Drives Deliver Better Video Thanks To New Streaming Data Standard

A family of consumer-class hard disk drives from Seagate Technology uses a new video streaming standard to deliver improved video playback in applications like digital video recorders (DVRs), set-top boxes, and video editing. Working closely with Toshiba, Thomson, Sony, Pioneer, Pace, Nokia, Motorola, Echostar, and other companies, Seagate incorporated the ATA standard streaming command set in the CE family. The CE drives are also compatible with ATA/7 standard firmware, so OEMs can optimize the drive for their particular application.

Easy to use stream-management commands optimize the CE drives for the sequential task of streaming continuous audio/video (A/V) files. This delivers more consistent performance than PC hard drives, which contain storage control software designed for fragmented text-based documents. System manufacturers also require A/V streaming to be a higher priority than the repetitive error-checking procedures used in PC applications, which slow down video streaming.

The drives include manufacturer-defined error-checking parameters for smoother streams. Their power-management technology uses less peak power at startup than other drives in their class, allowing them to meet the lower power requirements of most consumer electronics applications.