Now, we’ve all witnessed the popularity of flash memory in portable devices (especially DAPs and PMPs), due in most part to the fact that this type has no moving parts, making it more suitable for products that risk getting dropped and bumped. Still, the fact is that hard drives still have the edge when it comes to capacity.

In line with this, Hitachi just announced that it has developed the world’s smallest read-head technology for HDDs. This, it said, will enable 3.5-inch drives with a capacity of 4TB, and 2.5-inch versions with 1TB, both in the next four years. Before you start doubting, remember that the company’s perpendicular recording allowed it to develop 1TB consumer hard drives (which, unfortunately, have yet to be released). Anyway, more memory is always a good thing, right? Now let’s just hope that battery capacity catches up.

[via engadget]