InPhase 300GB holographic storage solution out the door

With 1TB 3.5-inch hard drives making the rounds these days, a little bit of the charm has worn off of InPhase Technologies' 300GB holographic storage discs, which are now available for $180 a pop -- but only a little. The 1.5mm platters will scale up to 1.6TB by 2010, and data transfer rates are currently at 20MBps. The storage medium promises a 50-year lifespan for data, and the Tapestry HDS-300R drive for recording the data can emulate a DVD, CD, magnetic optical or tape drive to make building software to record to the discs as easy as can be. Strangely, InPhase doesn't want this thing pegged up for a boring life of data backup: according to Liz Murphy, InPhase marketing VP, "We're not going to play in the back-up market at all." Current clients include Turner Broadcasting, the US Geological Survey and Lockheed Martin -- hopefully they all got that memo on how very un-hip data backup is. A re-writeable version is due for 2008, and while we're not sure how much the Tapestry drive is going for, we figure if you have to ask... well, you know the rest.