Seagate and WD sign on for Intel Thunderbolt support

Andre Yoskowitz
26 Feb 2011 1:22

The two largest HDD makers, Seagate and Western Digital have confirmed today that they will support Intel's newly launched Thunderbolt interconnect technology.
Both will have drives available with the technology during 2011.
Says WD of the move:

Western Digital believes Thunderbolt technology will bring both new performance levels and simpler connectivity for consumers to access and enjoy their digital media in new and innovative ways.

And Seagate, similarly:

Seagate will support Thunderbolt with our external GoFlex drives with in calendar year 2011.

WD and Seagate combine for just over 50 percent of all the HDDs sold globally, and Seagate did not initially endorse the standard, like Apple and WD did.
Xbit explains Thunderbolt, which was recently just shown off by Apple on their MacBook Pro refreshes:

Thunderbolt technology supports two low-latency communications protocols - PCI Express for data transfer and DisplayPort for displays. Thunderbolt technology works on data streams in both directions, at the same time, so users get the benefit of full bandwidth in both directions, over a single cable. With the two independent channels, a full 10Gb/s of bandwidth (something not truly needed for HDDs these days) can be provided for the first device in the chain of the devices.
All Thunderbolt technology devices share a common Mini DisplayPort connector. Intel's Thunderbolt controllers interconnect a PC and other devices, transmitting and receiving packetized traffic for both PCIe and DisplayPort protocols and thus makers HDDs need to develop or use additional controllers to make their drives compatible with the TB I/O interface.