Indeed, a quick look at today's prices shows that several 500GB hard drives have fallen below the $0.25-per-gigabyte level. We are now seeing the 500GB drive category quickly becoming the new sweet spot for the desktop from both a cost and performance viewpoint. As hard drive capacities have now soared to 1TB range, we now see that 500GB drives have finally reached a point where they are a solid if not spectacular value for the majority of end-users who use their systems for everything from video/audio encoding to gaming.

Historically, our Buyer's Guides have allowed 500GB hard drive recommendations in only the highest end systems where price is less of an issue. While that is an interesting bit of history as well as a brief look at what's coming down the pipeline, we are here today to discuss the Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 500GB drive. The new 7200.11 series will feature capacities from 250GB to 1TB. Along with several new product enhancements, Seagate will increase their per-platter capacities to 250GB and early testing shows sustained transfer rates right over 100 MB/s not to mention improved seek times.

Their new 7200.11 series will be introduced shortly that features their next generation PMR technology. While Seagate has not introduced capacities larger than 750GB or revised their product lineup since a year ago that does not mean they have not been busy. The Barracuda 7200.10 product was the first desktop centric hard drive to feature perpendicular magnetic recording technology. The Barracuda 7200.10 series quickly became their flagship product for personal desktop solutions with the 7200.9 series quickly being regulated as a value performance offering. Seagate announced the Barracuda 7200.10 series over a year ago as the successor to their Barracuda 7200.9 series with much surprise as that particular product line had only been marketed for a very short period.

Seagate barracuda 7200.10 320gb