Hefty hard drive means more music

The drive was announced at the Computex trade show in Taiwan

iPod users could soon be storing even more tracks on their music players.

Electronics giant Toshiba is planning to launch a 60GB version of its 1.8 inch (4.5cm) hard drive.

One of the biggest customers for earlier versions of this small drive has been Apple which has used them inside the full-size iPod.

The extra space could mean that the number of songs an iPod can store soars to 15,000. The new drive is due to go on sale in late summer or early autumn.

A rival digital music player by Creative, the Nomad Zen jukebox, already comes with a 60GB hard drive

Size matters

Currently the largest capacity iPod has a 40GB Toshiba hard drive onboard, enough for about 10,000 songs. By contrast the iPod mini uses a 4GB one inch (2.5cm) drive made by Hitachi that can hold about 1,000 tracks.

Apple does not traditionally comment on forthcoming products and has not confirmed that it will be producing a roomier iPod.

However, technology news websites reported a Toshiba spokeswoman as saying that Apple was one of the first customers for the bigger drive.

Toshiba also said it was getting a lot of interest from other firms who make and sell portable media players and digital recorders.

By the end of 2004 Toshiba expects to be producing more than a million of its 1.8 inch and 2.5 inch (6.3cm) hard drives per month.

Toshiba made the announcement at the Computex trade show that is currently under way in Taiwan.