HGST has introduced a disk drive to stop you getting lost in Death Valley. Cars and disk drives mix surprisingly well - so long as you ruggedise the drive so the head and platter can move each move around a bit, taking vibration and temperature changes into account, while still being able to read data. Today's satnav and …

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Wednesday 2nd October 2013 14:22 GMT Tom_

Racetrack Playa

The road past Teakettle Junction, heading out to Racetrack Playa is perfect for testing this. There's a good long stretch that's like driving along corrugated iron, with corrugations about a foot apart. I've never vibrated so much in my life.

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1. Wednesday 2nd October 2013 14:49 GMT Omgwtfbbqtime
  
  Re: Racetrack Playa
  
  That's what she said
  
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Wednesday 2nd October 2013 14:50 GMT Ross K

Remember The DeathStar Drive?

I wouldn't use an IBM/HGST hard disk if you were giving them away for free.

The *scratch* *scratch* *scratch* *scratch* *CLONK* *scratch* *scratch* *scratch* *scratch* *CLONK* *scratch* *scratch* *scratch* *scratch* *CLONK* soundtrack is still lodged in my brain.

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1. Wednesday 2nd October 2013 16:17 GMT Anonymous Coward
  
  Re: Remember The DeathStar Drive?
  
  The large pile of HGST drives sitting before me awaiting warranty return agree with you.
  
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Wednesday 2nd October 2013 16:17 GMT Ian Michael Gumby

Meh

SSDs like mSATA drives can take more abuse and have enough storage capacity to handle storing maps.

The other thing to consider that the move is to wi-fi enable your car so that you can get updates to the maps over the air. (Also enable things like Traffic.com too)

The other thing to consider is that if your car is in the US, its highly unlikely to also be in Europe so why store Europe, Asia, Australia maps on your sat nav if you're never going to use them?

Just saying...

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Thursday 3rd October 2013 03:17 GMT Anonymous Coward

Altitudes up to 18,000 feet??

What about altitudes below sea level? That would be rather important, seeing as how Death Valley is all well below sea level!

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Thursday 3rd October 2013 03:39 GMT Kevin McMurtrie

Everything's fine...the clicking is nothing

IBM's drive tech must carry a curse. Every Hitachi drive that came with my computers failed within two years, which is only a few months better than the infamous IBM "Deathstars". I could maybe forgive that but I can't forgive that the SMART status always said that everything was perfectly fine even as the drive's media was deteriorating faster than blocks could be re-mapped to spares. That's willful incompetence.

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