QUANTUM INTRODUCES TWO HIGH-CAPACITY DRIVE FAMILIES WITH MR HEADS AND
ADVANCED READ CHANNELS

Technological strength is the foundation for new levels of performance,
reliability and disk capacity for 3.5-inch drives

MILPITAS, Calif., April 17, 1995 - Quantum Corporation (NMS:QNTM) today
announced the Quantum Empire II (5,400 RPM) and Quantum Atlas II (7,200
RPM) 3.5-inch drive families. Both families include 10-disk, 9.1 gigabyte
(GB) drives and one-inch-high 4.3GB and 2.1GB drives. These drives
incorporate advanced technologies required to meet the expanding storage
needs of disk-intensive applications, including those which are fueling
the information revolution.

The Quantum Empire II series, designed for the midrange market, combines
the areal density and performance benefits of a Partial Response Maximum
Likelihood (PRML) read channel and magnetoresistive (MR) heads. Quantum is
the first independent drive manufacturer to combine both new technologies
into a single drive design.

The Quantum Atlas II series for high-end systems takes full advantage of
the company's extensive ASIC and firmware design capabilities to provide
industry-leading random and sequential performance. The Quantum Atlas II
drives incorporate MR heads and the industry's highest performance
interfaces: Ultra SCSI and the new Fibre Channel Arbitrated Loop (FC-AL)
interface.

"Since last October when Quantum acquired Digital Equipment Corporation's
storage business, we have focused on leveraging the technological
strengths and design capabilities of our two drive development centers to
provide the highest levels of drive performance and reliability. With this
product announcement, the strength of our combined technology portfolio
and our ability to leverage cross-site technologies is evident," said
Robert K. Maeser, president of Quantum's High Capacity Storage Group. "The
Quantum Atlas II and Quantum Empire II drives will allow us to build upon
the success we have achieved with current OEM and distribution customers,
open doors to new high-capacity customers, and will enable Quantum to
strengthen its leadership position in the high-end market."

Technology provides performance matched to the market needs

The technology-rich Quantum Empire II and Quantum Atlas II drives match
performance to the requirements of their respective target segments within
the high-capacity, high-performance marketplace. The Quantum Empire II
drives provide the optimum balance of performance and cost for the
cost-sensitive mid-range market that includes high-end PCs, desktop
workstations, PC servers and low-end disk arrays. The company's
third-generation PRML read channel provides fast internal data rates of 90
megabits per second (Mbit/sec). The single-chip PRML channel draws less
power and has a lower cost structure than Quantum's previous two-chip
implementations.

The Quantum Atlas II drives deliver leading-edge performance and
reliability for the mission-critical data managed by high-end servers
(video, database, super), high-end RAID subsystems, technical workstations
and other multi-user systems. The drives offer the lowest seek times in
the industry - less than 7.9 milliseconds (ms) - and one of the fastest
read channels operating at 110 Mbit/sec. By executing a number of
functions in hardware rather than firmware, Quantum's patented ASABET
chipset reduces command overhead and improves overall performance.

               Quantum Empire II drives      Quantum Atlas II drives

 Spin rate           5,400 RPM                       7,200 RPM
 Seek time             8.9ms                           <7.9ms
 Read channel rate   90Mbit/sec.                   110Mbits/sec.
 Cache size            512K                            1,024K
 Command overhead      <150us                          <100us
 External data rate (max.)     40MB/sec.             200MB/sec.

The Quantum Atlas II and Quantum Empire II products include MR heads
designed and manufactured by Quantum's Recording Heads Group. To ensure
that the areal density benefits of the MR heads are fully realized, the
drives include a simplified, more reliable controller called an ID-less
controller, which also provides sequential throughput benefits.

Quantum's expertise in SCSI controller design has led to the introduction
of the company's second-generation Ultra SCSI interface. The Quantum
Empire II and Quantum Atlas II families will be available with 8-bit and
16-bit Ultra SCSI and the 80-pin single connector attachment (SCA). The
Quantum Atlas II drives also offer wide differential Ultra SCSI. The new
FC-AL interface, capable of data transfer rates of up to 200 megabytes per
second, will be available for the Quantum Atlas II drives in the first
quarter of 1996.

Exceptional reliability

The reliability of the new drives results from advanced ASIC integration
and an efficient mechanical design that requires 50 percent fewer heads
and disks than drives with the same capacities (2GB and 4GB) introduced
just one year ago. The drives provide the lowest power consumption in
their respective classes: as low as 12 watts (idle) for the Quantum Atlas
II 9.1GB drives and 9 watts (idle) for the Quantum Empire II 9.1GB drives.
These combined attributes have led to projected field Mean Time Between
Failure ratings of 1,000,000 hours. Both drive families are covered by a
five-year warranty.

Taking reliability a step further, the Quantum drives include the company's
S.M.A.R.T. (Self-Monitoring Analysis and Reporting Technology) feature.
This feature enables system managers to monitor the drives' performance
through diagnostics at the host level. S.M.A.R.T. is practical for those
who want to proactively identify and replace drives that are not
performing optimally due to age, environmental conditions or other
parameters. This is especially important for servers, disk arrays and
multi-user systems.

Serving the digitized world

The Quantum Empire II and Quantum Atlas II drives were also designed for a
range of new digital applications that are gaining in popularity: video on
demand, video production and editing, multimedia, the Internet and other
on-line services.

"To fuel the growth of these applications, storage must provide higher
speeds, improved reliability and more capacity at a lower cost per
megabyte," said Jack Sharp, Quantum's vice president of marketing for the
High Capacity Storage Group. "Through our extensive technology portfolio
and our demonstrated ability to develop application-specific features, we
will continue our leadership role in this growing opportunity for
storage."

Pricing and Availability

Volume production of the Quantum Empire II and Quantum Atlas II drives will
begin in the fourth quarter of 1995, with evaluation units available in
the third quarter. Single unit OEM prices are as follows:

Quantum Atlas II drives        Quantum Empire II drives:

    9.1GB: $2,995                  9.1GB: $2,495
    4.3GB: $1,795                  4.3GB: $1,495
    2.1GB: $1,195                  2.1GB: $995

About Quantum

Founded in 1980, Quantum Corporation designs and manufactures storage
products for today's digitized world. The largest global supplier of hard
disk drives, Quantum is widely recognized as the industry's quality
leader. The company sells a broad range of storage products to OEM and
distribution customers worldwide. Quantum's sales were $2.1 billion for
the fiscal year ending March 1994 and $2.4 billion for the first three
quarters of the current fiscal year. Quantum's world wide web home page
address is http: //www.quantum.com.

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