HP enlists Quantum to drive server sales

Hewlett-Packard (HP) has surged ahead in its attempts to keep up with server market leader Compaq by striking a deal with storage manufacturer Quantum to install 9Gb hard drives across its entire range of NetServers.

The deal closely follows Compaq's launch last week of 9Gb hard disk availability for its range of ProSignia servers. This is HP's second strategic deal in a week, following its alliance with Cisco, underlining its intention to attack the corporate networking market in 1997.

Both HP and Quantum are using the agreement to attract users in the burgeoning Internet and intranet markets, although Compaq systems group product manager Hugh Jenkins said the market has been demanding greater mass storage capacity for some time: "The 9Gb is a natural progression, especially as the cost of manufacturing megabytes has dropped significantly. Adding greater storage capacities is not a problem now, and as more companies collect more data and need more storage, we should be able to meet demand."

The Quantum Atlas II, 3.5-inch, 7,200 RPM drives have been designed to meet the needs of mission-critical, mass storage solutions including RAID, database servers, technical workstations and video editing systems. The drives also deliver seek times of 8ms and a read channel rate of 110Mbits/sec.