Unfortunately, lots of laptop manufacturers are stingy on internal storage, installing less to shave the price off their machines. If you're someone stuck with a laptop that has a measly 250GB of disk storage or even less, there's no need to settle for such a situation. Samsung Electronics has just announced its 500 gigabyte per platter, one terabyte internal hard disk drive, the Spinpoint M8, for use in mobile computing applications — such as laptops. The dual-platter Spinpoint M8 operates on a high-performance three gigabits per second SATA interface, provides an eight megabyte buffer memory and incorporates EcoSeek and NoiseGuard features for minimal noise levels. A redesign of the overall structure of the disk drive ensures enhanced shock resistance to protect the disk from physical fracture and data loss. The Spinpoint M8 is available worldwide with the 1TB drive retailing for just $129.

Now, just because there's 1TB in your laptop doesn't mean that you have enough data storage. Movie lovers and photographers will definitely need an external hard drive. Meet the new 4TB GoFlex Desk external hard drive from Seagate. This 4TB drive has the space to hold over 2,000 HD movies in a small footprint, with an attractive streamlined industrial design. The GoFlex hard drive can also be used as a back-up storage system, since it comes pre-loaded with back-up software, enabling the drive to provide automatic, continuous back-up with encryption for all your files. The included USB 3.0 adapter also works with USB 2.0 ports making it easy to connect to any computer. The adapter features an illuminated gauge to display available space on the drive. The 4TB GoFlex drive is Windows and Mac OS X compatible and has the flexibility to go between both operating systems. In addition to cross-platform compatibility, the GoFlex Desk drive can be utilized with the GoFlex Home adapter as a network drive. This storage is yours for $250.

Local storage is great, but if you've got connectivity, you might consider cloud storage for files you want to access anytime, from anyplace. Try cloud storage free with Amazon Cloud Drive (www.amazon.com/clouddrive). The basic plan gives you 5GB of free storage which can be accessed from eight different devices. Cloud Drive allows consumers to upload and store all kinds of digital files, including photos, videos and documents which are stored securely and available via web browser on any computer. Other popular online storage providers include ADrive (www.adrive.com), which offers 50GB of free online storage and backup. There's also SkyDrive, providing 25GB of free online storage for holders of Windows Live IDs. 

And if you think that consumers' storage demands are high, you just can't imagine how many  terabytes and even petabytes of storage that businesses require. Saudi Business Machines (SBM), the General Marketing Sales Representative of IBM in Saudi Arabia, recently hosted a roadshow in Jeddah, Riyadh and Al-Khobar to showcase IBM’s new storage solutions and their functions.

IBM’s latest storage solutions offer enterprises optimized storage tiering with the new IBM System Storage Easy Tier feature. Tiered storage is the assignment of different categories of data to different types of storage in order to reduce the total cost of storage. IBM offers flexible storage systems that scale or grow, without disrupting the performance of the overall system.

“The most advanced model of IBM’s System Storage has been designed to support even the most demanding business applications”, said Shawki Abousaleh, VP Systems Sales, SBM. “With a performance improvement of more than 150 percent, the new model has unparalleled resiliency features.”

And taking into consideration the number of security breaches that have occurred lately, IBM has developed new storage systems to increase security and reduce complexity with innovative self-encrypting drives. When drives or tape cartridges are physically removed from the storage system, IBM’s self-encrypting storage solutions automatically protect the data from any system not authorized to read the data. If a cartridge or drive were misplaced or stolen the information would be unreadable.

“The ability to ensure your data is secure even after it has been removed from your physical storage is important to all organizations. IBM’s new storage systems enable organizations achieve their business objectives by addressing the needs of important business applications,” concluded Victor Morales, director, STG sales, IBM Middle East & North Africa.