Western Digital is one of the largest harddrive manufacturers on the market it's the only manufacturer supplying a harddrive series we could call enthusiast-oriented, the Raptor series. The latest incarnation, known as Velociraptor, is just starting to find its way into enthusiast PCs. Unlike Seagate which has clear plans to launch Solid State Drives (SSD) of its own to counter the SSDs from other memory manufacturers, Western Digital is designing an even faster series of Raptor harddrives with a rotational speed of 20,000RPM.
VelociRaptor operates at 10,000RPM and has the lowest access times of all mechanical harddrives on the retail market. It also has sports some of the highest transfer rates, but with the fast improving SSD technology, the advantages of the mechanical drives are diminishing by the minute. Western Digital hopes to keep the enthusiast lineup alive by raising the RPM to 20,000, which should lower access times even further and boost transfer rates even more.
The drive is still in early development and there isn't even a launch date available at this time. What we do know is that the drive will be of the 2.5" formfactor and will be very quiet as the maker is working on improving the housing.
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Western Digital planning 20,000RPM Raptor harddrive
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