Rugged on the inside, the Hitachi Travelstar Z5K320 drive gives the G-DRIVE slim superior operating shock protection and quiet acoustics for use in the home, in the office or on the road.

ENGADGET: Hitachi GST's G-Drive Slim: world's thinnest 2.5-inch external hard drive

Hybrid hard drives combine NAND flash and magnetic disks, simplifying storage-element integration for OEM customers and providing a host of end user benefits: superior performance, responsiveness, lower power consumption, greater operating shock tolerance, and data protection.

ENGADGET: Western Digital builds 5mm-thick hybrid hard drive, Ultrabook makers sign on early

While the swifter SATA drives will likely benchmark a bit better than the PATA counterparts, both versions sport perpendicular magnetic recording to prevent data corruption, as well as "industry leading free-fall sensors" that pack 700G of operating shock tolerance.

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