Hybrid hard disc drives (HDD) have recently become a popular choice among notebook brand vendors for their ultrabook models, according to sources from ultrabook players.

Since storage components account for about 10-15% of ultrabook's total cost, to fulfill Intel's goal of launching ultrabook with a price below US$1,000 and its demand of having a boot-up time in between 8-45 seconds and physical size smaller than a standard 9.5mm hard drive, notebook brand vendors have eyed hybrid HDD as their new storage choice.

Since Hybrid HDDs have a lower cost than standard solid state drives (SSD) but can still allow an ultrabook to have a fast boot up time and storage efficiency to fulfill Intel's guidelines, many brand vendors have already been evaluating related solutions. Acer has already launched a model under its S3 series adopting a 320GB HDD with a 20GB SSD.

Although the initial wave of ultrabook models is still mainly adopting SSDs, models with hybrid HDDs may start appearing in later waves of ultrabook launches.