In the second quarter of 2010, external disk storage factory revenues hit 20.4 per cent higher than a year earlier.
Total global revenues for the market crept slightly above this figure, at 20.7 per cent growth or $6.8 billion (£4.4 billion) in all.
Liz Conner, senior research analyst for storage systems at IDC, says: "The gain from a relatively strong second half of 2009 shows continued customer investment and importance placed in the storage systems market."
Over the preceding six months, the external disk storage systems segment gained three per cent, compared with full-year growth of 18.6 per cent.
However, capacity shipments were up by a greater degree, increasing by 54.6 per cent year-on-year to reach 3,645 petabytes.
Ms Conner's former roles, prior to joining IDC, include a period of time with Tecolote Research conducting lifecycle cost estimates for the US Department of Defense.
