With Seagate's Monday introduction of Barracuda XT, the industry's first 2-TB enterprise hard drive with a 6-Gbit-per-second (6Gbps) SATA interface, it is evident that the hardware maker is working towards a leading edge in both storage performance and capacity.

Going by the information forwarded by David Burks, the company's director of product marketing for the Barracuda lineup, the newly-introduced 3.5-inch hard drive is aimed at increased performance capacity, by offering 7,200-rpm spin rate and a 64-MB cache.

Noting that the single drive can be used for high-end workstations and external storage devices, Burks touted the Barracuda's dual advantage of performance and storage, saying: "Before, to get 2 TBs, you needed to sacrifice performance. Or for performance, you needed smaller hard drives."

Burks also specified that to obtain maximum benefit from the new 6Gbps SATA interface, system builders and solution providers will have to use 6Gbps SATA controllers to match the new drives to motherboards or interface cards.

Along with amalgamating 2-TB capacity with 6Gbps performance, the new Seagate Barracuda XT - having a list price of $299 - also has a few features specific for the channel.

Saying that the OEM shipping dates would be announced later, Burks informed that the Barracuda XT includes a five-year warranty in place of the standard three-year warranty that comes with Seagate's other Barracuda desktop PC drives.