Seagate today introduced Constellation.2, the industry's first 2.5-inch enterprise-class hard drive to reach a record 1TB capacity. The Constellation.2 drive is designed for server storage applications and offers a solid combination of high capacity, leading 6Gb/s performance, superior data integrity, and best-in-class low power consumption.

The Constellation.2 drive is designed for system builders and OEMs who want to offer competitive, feature-rich, bulk storage solutions for a sustainable future. The Constellation.2 drive is fit for use in a range of applications in Directed Attached Storage (DAS), Network Attached Storage (NAS) and Storage Area Network (SAN) environments, from small-to-midsized businesses to the largest enterprise data centers storing and hosting data to the cloud."Data center managers continue to seek out more efficient storage technologies without sacrificing performance, while still meeting capacity growth requirements," said John Rydning, research director for IDC . "Reaching the 1TB capacity in a small form factor design gives IT managers more options to meet capacity requirements with efficient storage platforms. IDC expects the use of capacity-optimized drives like Seagate's 1TB Constellation.2 to increase by more than 50% from 2010 to 2014."

The Constellation.2 drive is offered in capacity choices of 250GB, 500GB, and 1TB, and with 6Gb/s SATA or 6Gb/s SAS interface options. Its advanced second-generation design provides improved data integrity with the new T10 Protection Information standard and an increase in reliability (1.4 million hours MTBF). With a Self Encrypting Drive (SED) option, data security is covered throughout the entire drive lifecycle.

"The Constellation.2 underscores Seagate's commitment to its customers to deliver industry-leading solutions that meet the demands of IT professionals today and tomorrow," said Carla Kennedy, vice president of Product Line Management, Seagate. "With its class-leading reliability, record-breaking capacity, and improvements made along its entire range of features, Constellation.2 drive is a perfect solution for dense server and storage systems."

"The enhanced capacity and reliability of the Seagate Constellation.2 drives will help deliver even greater value to Dell's customers focused on their ever-increasing storage needs," said Lewie Newcomb, executive director, Storage Core Technologies, Dell. "The Dell PowerVault storage enclosures and PowerEdge servers are being enabled for even more powerful storage alternatives using these energy-efficient, capacity-optimized, and performance-enhanced 2.5-inch drives."

Dell expects to ship systems with this drive starting in late December.

Seagate Unified Storage architecture delivers long-term business sustainability
Constellation.2 family fits within the Seagate Unified Storage Architecture, which converges best-of-breed technologies (Serial Attached SCSI, Small Form Factor and Self-Encrypting Drives) into a foundation for flexible, powerful and simple storage that boosts business and operational efficiency while reducing cost and complexity. Historically, the variety of drive interfaces, form factors and now, security solutions, can add complexity and cost for both IT professionals and OEMs - all which the Seagate Unified Storage architecture model resolves.

Constellation.2 drives are currently shipping to OEMs and the worldwide distribution channel. For more information about the Constellation family of drives, in addition to Seagate's other enterprise storage solutions, visit www.seagate.com. Visit the Seagate Inside IT Storage blog or follow us on the Seagate Enterprise IT Twitter page for regular updates about enterprise storage.