Tatum and Denim blog

Filed under: Laptops, Storage

Fujitsu keeps pumping out the hard drive innovation — this time the company is planning to ship a 1.2TB 2.5-inch hard drive by 2010. The company is planning on leveraging a new perpendicular recording method that allows researchers to create “ideally ‘ordered’ alumina nanohole patterns for isolated bit-by-bit recording on a large disk area” to accomplish the feat, which sounds pretty intense to us. Of course, by 2010 we’ll all probably be rocking at least a petabyte or two of desktop storage, but it’s still fun to dream.

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Filed under: Storage

Modders, you’d better watch your backs, because NEC and Hitachi are creeping up from the backside with some funky-fresh new hard drive cooling technology that will make you feel embarrassed and / or insignificant. The two Japanese powerhouses have developed a technology which knocks down the temperature of standard hard drives using a water-cooled plating, and also reduces noise levels of the storage devices to five decibels quieter than a whisper. The new technique employs noise absorbing, heat conducting plates which surround the drive, and a low-speed radiator fan to keep air moving. The companies say that the material used for the housing is the most efficient ever for conduction of heat, and that the drives are cooled more quickly and with less power. PCs will soon be made available with the drives (at least in Japan) for around ¥20,000 more than standard models — no word on when or if this technology is coming Stateside. [Warning: Read link requires subscription]

[Via Ars Technica]

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Filed under: Storage, Networking

While there’s not a great deal to distinguish it from the multitude of other NAS servers out there, Lanner’s new NS04-3100 looks like it should easily satisfy those with hefty storage appetites, offering four bays for some SATA drives of your choosing. Otherwise, you’ll get just about all the features you’d expect from a high-end NAS, including built-in WiFi, UPnP AV media server capabilities, iTunes server and DLNA support, and support for RAID 0, 1, 5 and JBOD configurations. Lanner is also promising “ultra-quiet operation” and minimal power draw from the server’s Marvel 88F5281 processor. No word on price, but it’s apparently available immediately for “sampling.”

[Via Akihabara News]

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Filed under: Storage, Networking

Those in the market for a boost in storage now have a couple more options to consider from Iomega, which has beefed up its StorCenter line of network hard drives with three new models. Coming in 500GB, 750GB, and 1TB varieties, these each boast 3.5-inch 7200 RPM SATA-II hard drives (two in the case of the 1TB model), along with an 8MB cache to keep things nice and speedy and a pair of USB ports should you need even more external storage. The 1TB model will also give you your choice of RAID 0, RAID 1, or JBOD configurations, and all three pack a number of network features, including Active Directory support and UPnP AV media server capability (no WiFi though). Look for all three to be available immediately, with them setting you back $270, $360, and $390 for the 500GB, 700GB, and 1TB models, respectively.

[Via Electronista]

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Filed under: Storage, Networking

We’ve seen NAS BitTorrent drives / servers before, but none quite as cheap or ugly as the AirLive WMU-6500FS. The Inquirer has gotten its hands on the funky gray PATA- or SATA-ready media stealer, and they give it a pretty decent once over. The drive comes with 32MB of RAM on board, 4MB of flash memory for the OS, and 802.11g. The BitTorrent and HTTP / FTP server clients all reside in the box and are accessible through your web browser, allowing you to engage in all sorts of energy-saving activities — like downloading lots of “films” without the need for any computers around. According to the review, the whole package can be yours for around $100. Of course, you can get all the thrilling details if you simply hit the read link.

[Thanks, Tech Luver]

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Filed under: Peripherals, Storage

ExpressCards may have stolen their thunder, but all those PCMCIA slots out there are far from useless just yet, as evidenced by this latest product from Japan’s ASKA Corporation. Its new HD32F portable hard drive will let you put that slot to use for some extra storage (either 20GB or 40GB), although you will have to put up with a rather large protuberance as a result (which you can pretty up a bit by sliding a picture into the drive’s built-in picture frame). For non-PCMCIA use, the drive can also simply be plugged in using a USB cable. Look for this one to set you back ¥14,700 or ¥27,825 ($124-$235) depending on the size — in Japan only, of course.

[Via Akihabara News]

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Filed under: Storage

We can only surmise that Fujitsu went ahead and stuffed its own brand spankin’ new 300GB 2.5-incher into the new Calmee Moon external hard drive, and for those who freak over simplistic contrasts in color, these ought to suit your fancy just fine. The black / white (and vice versa) themed units arrive in a sleek, all-aluminum enclosure, include a one-touch backup feature, and sport both USB and eSATA interfaces. Sadly, there’s no mention of when we can expect to shell out for these eye-catchers, but it shouldn’t be too much longer for those stationed in Korea.

[Via AVing]

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Filed under: Storage

While Western Digital and others are busy making power-saving hard drives with various start and stop measures these days, Fujitsu seems to going in a different direction entirely, today announcing a new line of drives designed for 24-hour continuous operation. Intended primarly for use in ATMs, POS systems, medical equipment, and other industrial applications the new MHY2 BS series of 2.5-inch drives boasts capacities up to 200GB, along with a 5,400 rpm disk speed and a SATA interface. While those won’t be available until the end of August, Fujitsu has two other non-stop drive series available now, including the 7,200 rpm MHW2 BK Series, and the MHW2 AC Series, which is able to withstand extremely high and low temperatures.

[Via Akihabara News]

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Filed under: Storage

Just in case 1.5TB wasn’t enough for you, Western Digital’s now gone and topped off its entire range of dual-drive My Book external hard drives with a full 2TB of storage. That includes the My Book World Edition II, the My Book Pro Edition II, and My Book Premium Edition II models, each of which appear to be otherwise unchanged from their previous incarnations. Of course, all that storage excess doesn’t exactly come cheap, with the 2TB versions of the drives running between $749 and $799 depending on the model.

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Filed under: Portable Audio, Portable Video

Frustrated with all the limitations that come with just 60GB of hard drive space? We know, it can indeed be nerve-racking, but here to lower your blood pressure is John P., who has successfully crammed a capacious 100GB HDD into the casing of Creative’s Zen Vision W. The modder began by ordering a Toshiba MK1011GAH, downloading the latest Creative firmware, and stripping back the PMP to access its innards. Afterwards, a dab of tape pulling, ribbon cable insertion, and firmware loading brought the device back to life, and without much fuss at all, a 100GB Vision W was born. We know you’re salivating at the thought, so go on, hit the read link for all the replication details you need.

[Via MAKE]

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Filed under: Storage

Kanguru may have beaten them to the punch, but we suspect Western Digital will attract a fair bit more attention with its own move into greener hard drives, with the company today announcing its new GreenPower initiative. According to the company, the new family of drives will encompass desktop, enterprise, CE and external hard
drives, and will include drives ranging in size from 320GB to 1TB. Those will apparently each boast up to a 40% savings in power consumption, which could translate to a $10 savings per drive each year on your power bill. A GreenPower version of Western Digital’s 1TB Caviar GP hard drive will be the first out the gate, shipping first in the form of a WD My Book external drive later this month, with a standard desktop version set to follow in August. Other GreenPower drives will then apparently start shipping in volume within the third quarter of this year.

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Filed under: Storage

LaCie is a company that can’t help itself when it comes to large capacity drives. Just when you thought they couldn’t get the “Big Disk Extreme” to be any bigger or more extreme, they go and produce a 2TB version. Unlike the company’s network drive with massive capacity, this is pretty standard LaCie fare if you look at the specs, like the 32MB cache, Firewire 400, dual Firewire 800 ports (for daisy-chaining), USB 2.0, and built-in RAID 0. The drive also features a button which can be mapped to launch an application of your choosing, though we’re sure they’d prefer that it launches Retrospect Express to backup your data.

[Via Macworld]

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Filed under: Storage

Looks like TrekStor is the latest to join the increasingly less-exclusive terabyte club, with it recently introducing its 1TB DataStation duo w.u external USB hard drive. As you might be able to tell from its size, this one actually boasts two 500GB hard drives stacked on top of each other, although they’ll apparently show up as a single 1TB drive on your computer. Otherwise, this one looks to be a pretty standard deal, boasting backup capabilities courtesy of the included Nero BackItUp2 Essentials software, and an aluminum housing that supposedly dissipates heat without the need for a fan. If that’ll do, you can grab one of these now for a list price of $430.

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Filed under: Storage

Fujitsu’s been selling well-regarded hard drives in branded external enclosures for a while now, so it’s no surprise the company is trumpeting the arrival of 300GB 2.5-inch drives with a new line of pocket drives. The USB-powered 4200rpm drives feature a new 16-point shock absorber and the usual array of security software that’ll get wiped out during the first reformat. Expect to see these hit shelves in Q3 for $229, no word on when the bare drive will be available.

[Via MobileWhack]

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Filed under: Desktops

The concept of light powered computing has surfaced again, this time thanks to a group of researchers at Radboud University Nijmegen in the Netherlands. Using laser technology that we’re not even going to pretend to understand, they’ve figured out a way of transferring data in speeds measured in quadrillionths of a second — a measurement so fast even our spell checker doesn’t recognize it. The technology is around 100 times faster than traditional magnetic storage methods, but it still has some way to go until it can replace your hard drive: for one thing, the researchers need to figure out a way to reduce the footprint of the laser, currently at an apparently massive 5 microns width. As always, we shall wait in anticipation for any developments.

[Via Slashdot]

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Filed under: Storage

Cute though it may be, Sarotech’s Cutie Bio portable hard drive is downright serious about data protection. Not one to let a lingering stranger peek beneath its dazzling shell, this pocket-friendly drive touts a built-in fingerprint scanner to protect the owner from spying eyes should it become lost or stolen. Additionally, the drive is built to handle drops and shocks as the head parks itself in freefall, and the USB 2.0 connection ensures speedy transfers when in a rush. Inside, you’ll find a 2.5-inch 100GB hard drive just hankering for piles upon piles of juicy information, and this uber-protective device will run you ₩150,000 ($162) whenever it lands in South Korea.

[Via AVing]

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As if stuffing a quarter terabyte onto a single Barracuda platter and finally matching Hitachi in the 1TB realm weren’t enough to gloat about, Seagate is now unveiling a hard drive aimed squarely at those reading this from the Amazon Rainforest (or a vanilla construction area, but you understand). The second-generation SATA EE25 drive — easily dubbed the EE25.2 — is available in sizes up to 80GB and can handle extreme temperatures, sensational heights, ’round the clock operation, 90-percent humidity, and drops / shocks that would likely put you out of commission before your data. No word yet on pricing nor availability, but don’t expect 80 gigabytes of nearly indestructible storage to come without a premium.

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Filed under: Storage

We already glanced at Samsung’s SpinPoint F1, but the firm also let four other storage devices out of the bag (officially, at least) alongside its 1TB behemoth at its storage press conference in NYC. Up first is the SpinPoint N2 series of 1.8-inch HDDs, which offers up a “world’s largest” 120GB flavor at 4200RPM for a dollar under $250. Catering to the 2.5-inch hard drive buyer, the MH80 lineup that we’ve been hearing about finally went official, and the “world’s first” hybrid HDD to come in a 160GB iteration was introduced alongside a bevy of other SpinPoint M5 offerings ranging from 60GB to 250GB (in the dual-disk model). In the burning realm, the WriteMaster SE-T084L portable slot-loaded DVD writer enables USB disc writing with minimal fuss for just $150, while the $70 Super-WriteMaster SH-S203 SATA burner (falsely) claims the “world’s fastest” title by churning out discs at 20x. Thankfully for those intrigued, all of the aforementioned devices are currently shipping, so snagging one (or more) in the near future ought not cause too much grief.

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Filed under: Storage

Just a day after Hitachi and Philips boasted about its newest external 1TB offerings, Seagate is up on its own soap box clamoring over the “industry’s first 250GB-per-disc, 3.5-inch disc drive.” Touting the second-generation of perpendicular magnetic recording technology, the newest Barracuda 7200.10 stretches areal density limits by stuffing 180Gb per square inch, and also manages to “set new benchmarks” for power consumption, acoustics, and performance. The drives will feature a 3Gbps SATA interface and should pop up in future external models, but for now you can probably grab one in a retail box as Seagate has reportedly achieved worldwide volume deployments.

[Via TGDaily]

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Filed under: Storage

Western Digital has given a boost to its Passport line of external USB hard drives, today introducing a new 250GB model that makes the previous top-end 160GB drive look positively paltry in comparison. While the exact type of hard drive crammed in there isn’t clear, like other Passport drives, it’s most definitely of the 2.5-inch variety, with the entire enclosure measuring just 5.11 x 3.14 x 0.59 inches. You’ll also get the usual complement of pre-loaded software, including Western Digital’s WD Sync software and Google Desktop — no Mac software here, although the drive itself will work just fine. If that’ll do, you can get your drive now for an even $200.

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Filed under: Storage

Philips certainly isn’t the first company to shove 1TB of storage into some form of external enclosure, but the recently-unveiled SPD5130 does manage to strip the NAS niceties and add an eSATA interface all the while. Of course, users can still plug this one in via USB 2.0, and everyone should appreciate the 32MB included buffer for “enhanced transfer stability.” Externally, the 1TB drive is wrapped in a thick aluminum shell that should protect it from minor battles, touts a one-click backup button, and it even includes an intelligent power management feature that powers it up and down with the PC it is attached to. Reportedly, the SPD5130 should be available to customers in Europe and the US pretty soon, and while we haven’t seen anything official just yet, we’re hearing that it’ll run €449 across the pond and $499 here on American soil.

[Via Pocket-Lint]

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While not nearly as capacious as PQI’s 256GB behemoth of an SSD, SanDisk is creeping ever closer by bumping its 1.8- and 2.5-inch SSD to 64GB. Previously capped at 32GB, the SATA 5000 and UATA 5000 series are now doubling in capacity and ready to become your next drop-in hard drive replacement. The devices reportedly sport a sustained read rate of around 67Mbps, a random read rate of 7,000 IOPS, and consume about half as much energy as its traditional HDD counterparts. No word just yet on pricing, but SanDisk is reportedly planning to offer up 64GB engineering samples in Q3, while mass production is scheduled to commence by the year’s end.

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Filed under: Peripherals, Storage

While flash drives and pocket hard drives are all well and good, sometimes you just gotta move all the data on that 1TB monster to another machine and go — and Addonics has got you data-intensive road warriors covered with their new Diamond line of SATA / eSATA hard drive enclosures and cradles. Mounting a drive in the enclosure gives you what appears to be a regular, if somewhat slim, eSATA drive, but the entire unit can then be slid into one of the Diamond cradles mounted in a 5.25-inch bay, giving you a host of internal connection options, from plain ol’ USB 2.0 to direct SATA to SCSI. Depending on how you configure your setup, prices range all over the place, but a standard SATA / eSATA rig should only set you back about $50, according to Addonics. Not bad, not bad at all.

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Filed under: Storage

Now that just about everyone else has went and upped their NAS capacity to two whole terabytes, LaCie is strutting in fashionably late with its forthcoming 2TB Ethernet Big Disk. The 2- x 7- x 11-inch enclosure sports the typical metallic LaCie design scheme, plays nice with Windows, OS X, and Linux operating systems, and sports a web user interface that’s apparently so easy a caveman (or your grandmother) could use it. The drive sports an Ethernet jack for connecting to a network, handles media streaming to UPnP-compatible devices, and packs a duo of USB ports that can be used to interface directly with a computer or for daisy-chaining another external HDD. Look for LaCie’s 2TB NAS to land anytime for a stiff $1,099 here in the US.

[Via TGDaily]

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Filed under: Storage

While Fujitsu works overtime in order to boost hard drive capacity by 500-percent in just two years, researchers at the University of Hamburg in Germany are devising a method to move magnetically-stored data around a HDD “a hundred times faster than currently possible.” Guido Meier and colleagues are purportedly using “nanosecond pulses of electric current to push magnetic regions along a wire at 110-meters per second,” which easily trumps today’s method of using comparatively slow spinning discs to access data. Additionally, their vision of the next-generation hard drive will sport fewer mechanical parts in order to lessen the “wear and tear” that existing units face. Notably, the idea behind the creation was actually conjured up by an IBM employee in 2004, but if the Germans crafting the current prototype have anything to say about it, said idea could turn into reality sooner than later.

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Filed under: Storage

Fujitsu is always talking up this or that hard drive technology that’s totally going to revolutionize the industry and so on, but at least this time around they’ve got some “solid” numbers. It’s that same “areal density” spiel again, with Fujitsu claiming that a new vertical magnetic recording tech based on crystalline magnesium oxide allows them to sense even smaller magnetic pits, thereby allowing them to squeeze more data into each square inch. Fujitsu was promising 1TB per square inch a few months back, but it seems now they’ll settle for 500-800GB per square inch — which translates to a roughly 500 percent capacity increase — and should be shipping samples out in a couple years. Start planning now how to best fill a 5TB drive, we’re leaning towards backing up a few hundred DVDs and filling the rest with polka music — it’s a hard job, but somebody’s got to do it. [Warning: subscription required]

[Via The Inquirer]

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Filed under: Household, Storage

We already knew that we had to sacrifice our precious holiday decorations in order to get maximum bandwidth and coverage from our WiFi routers, and now it looks like we may have to sweat out the summer months sans air conditioning if an anecdotal, single-source article in Associated Content proves accurate. According to sole interviewee Ben Carmichel of ESS Data Recovery, his company sees “a 20% increase in failed hard drives hitting our lab in the summer as [opposed to] the winter,” and believes from surveying customers and the uptick in electronic-related issues that AC-triggered power surges are largely to blame. Of course, this alleged risk is easy enough to minimize by utilizing an uniterrupted power source for your PC and configuring your drives in a RAID 1 or 5, so it doesn’t seem too difficult to have your cake and eat it too in this case. Or you could set up shop in Siberia and just avoid this nonsense altogether.

[Via The Inquirer, thanks John K.]

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Filed under: Laptops, Storage

While 200GB laptop drives are nothing new — we’ve already seen models from a number of manufacturers, and even a 300GB behemoth from Fujitsu — Hitachi is claiming that its latest 2.5-inch HDD, the Travelstar 7K200, is the “industry’s highest-capacity, highest-performing notebook hard drive with optional data encryption technology.” Said bulk encryption, which uses a key to scramble and unscramble data as it’s written and read, is implemented at the hardware level and is said to obviate the need for devices such as degaussers because users can simply delete the key before disposing of the drive. You’ll be able to get your hands on a retail 7K200 sometime this summer for about $250, or if you simply can’t wait for this supposedly unrivaled combo of capacity and security, Dell is offering these platters immediately on all its XPS and Alienware notebooks, with 400GB dual-drive configurations also available.

[Via PC Launches]

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Filed under: Storage

Nearly two years ago we all stood in awe of OWC’s 1TB Mercury Elite Pro Aluminum Dual RAID, and just a few days after the company announced its multifaceted Quad Interface variety, now its upping the ante again. The 2TB edition of the external HDD presumably packs a pair of Hitachi’s 7K1000 drives into an enclosure no bigger than any other twin-stuffed unit, and provides data transfer rates of over 80Mbps. The RAID 0 array is reportedly “designed to meet the performance demands of video and audio production,” and while it’s not exactly implied, to put a solid dent in your wallet as well. The drive connects up via USB 2.0 or FireWire 400 / 800, and can be snapped up now if you’re willing to hand over $1,099.99.

[Via MacMinute]

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Filed under: Storage

Nah, WiebeTech’s latest RAID enclosures can’t quite offer up the internal storage capacity seen on Novac’s iterations, but the RT5 and RT5e still pack an awful lot of capacity with a handle on top. The RT5 packs a nice variety of connection options, as users will find twin FireWire 800 ports along with one eSATA and USB 2.0 connector to boot, and there should be enough room in there to cram “up to 2TB” of HDDs for on-the-go redundancy. The RT5e differs ever-so-slightly by giving us the means to stuff five 750GB IDE drives in the case, leaving you with up to 3.75TB of space to read / write on via the sole eSATA jack. The enclosures sport five reloadable, lockable drive trays, a rugged exterior that shouldn’t suffer from minor bumps and bruises, and while an empty rendition will run you $1,699.95, WiebeTech will gladly sell ‘em pre-populated for anywhere from $2,259.95 to a steep $4,149.95 depending on drive selections.

[Via Macworld]

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Filed under: Gaming, Peripherals

It looks like Microsoft has decided to return some of its record-breaking profits back to the consumer in the form of a free Xbox 360 Hard Drive Transfer Kit for Elite owners — although some will look at this gesture as less of a gift (being that it could have just been included in the box with all Elites) and more of a hassle to get a one-time-use product that already comes bundled with the standalone 120GB drive. Interested parties can grab the necessary form by following the Read link, but you’ll need the serial numbers of both 360s to qualify, so if you were just looking for a free cable to tie up your pets or friends, you’re out of luck. [Warning: PDF link]

[Via Joystiq, thanks Josh F.]

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Filed under: HDTV, Home Entertainment, Storage

We know, no one likes paying extra for those built-in backup features that you reckon are just as easily handled by your own diligence, but TrekStor’s latest external hard drive boasts even more fanciness for your hard-earned buck. Aside from coming bundled with Nero’s BackItUp2 Essentials, the dashing aluminum drive packs an infrared remote, AV adapter, USB 2.0 connectivity, and a front-panel full of media-centric playback controls for times when the remote mysteriously vanishes. The unit was designed to capture your video files, pictures, and other multimedia, and then plug right in to any television for instant, painless viewing / listening. Additionally, it plays nice with OS X, Linux, and nearly every flavor of Windows, and handles MPEG1/2/4, AVI, DivX, XviD, MP3, WMA, WAV, and OGG file formats all on its own. HD freaks aren’t forgotten either, as 720p / 1080i is also in the cards thanks to its component output capabilities, and the optical digital audio output can even pipe surround sound from the HDD to your AV system. The MovieStation maxi t.u comes in 250GB, 320GB, 400GB, and half terabyte sizes, but unfortunately, no pricing deets were readily available just yet. [Warning: PDF read link]

[Via SvartLinks]

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Filed under: Laptops, Storage

Not a moment too soon, Dell has finally decided to bite and offer up solid state disc drives in a couple of its Latitudes. Joining Sony, Fujitsu, and Samsung (just to name a few), the Texas powerhouse has just announced that users can satisfy their SSD cravings by snapping up a D420 or D620 ATG laptop, both of which can contain a 1.8-inch 32GB SSD drive from SanDisk. According to the release, the drives should be available right now as an add-on option for the US market (Europe and Asia to “follow soon”), but opting for one of these suckas will cost you $549 more than a traditional HDD.

[Via Electronista]

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Filed under: Digital Cameras, Storage

When lugging around dozens of unlabeled flash cards just won’t suffice, there’s nothing better to have around than a memory card-lovin’ portable hard drive. Joining quite a few others in this growing arena is the XS-Drive 2 Smart 2300, which rocks anywhere between 40GB to 160GB of internal hard drive space, a swank OLED display, two hours of battery life, USB 2.0 connectivity, and a “simplistic two button control scheme.” Additionally, you’ll find support for CF, MicroDrive, MSDuo, MSPro, SD, miniSD, microSD, SDHC, MMC, MMC, xD, and a host of lesser used flash card formats, and you can also utilize the built-in GUI to delete unwanted pictures before slapping it back in the digicam. Best of all, the XS-Drive 2 Smart 2300 is purportedly available right now, and considering the relatively low £99 ($197) asking price for the 60GB rendition, it doesn’t look like a half bad option for consolidating.

[Via PhotographyBlog]

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BOLD MOVES: THE FUTURE OF FORD A new documentary series. Be part of the transformation as it happens in real-time

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Filed under: Storage

You’ve seen it announced and in the wild, and you’ve probably been wondering if the $400 or so required to procure the 1TB beast was indeed worth it. Thankfully, TomsHardware has the guidance you’ve been yearning for, as it opened up its test bench and welcomed Hitachi’s 7K1000 with open arms. The 935.5GB of usable space brought smiles to all involved, provided the highest transfer rate of all 7,200RPM drives that it was benchmarked against, and it was even said to “outperform the Seagate Barracuda 7200.10.” Truthfully, it was difficult to find any negatives on the behemoth in terms of sheer performance aside from its (forgivable) inability to keep up with the 10,000RPM WD Raptor and its toasty nature, but the reality set in when the review crew began to evaluate the value presented in such a dense, albeit expensive, HDD. Frankly, reviewers claimed that picking this drive up over a pair of cheaper 500GB drives “wouldn’t make a lot of sense,” but if you’re in dire need of cramming 1TB of, um, PowerPoint presentations onto a single unit, it’s far from a bad option.

[Via DigitalMediaThoughts]

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BOLD MOVES: THE FUTURE OF FORD A new documentary series. Be part of the transformation as it happens in real-time

Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!

Filed under: Storage

By now, it’s probably safe to assume that you’ve found a peripheral or two to occupy your previously lonely ExpressCard slot, but if you’re still miffed when it comes to the oh-so-overlooked PCMCIA slot, Stealth Imaging’s got your answer. During NAB 2007, the firm announced that it would be offering up a 120GB NAND solid-state hard disc drive in the form of a CardBus Type II adapter, which would check in at 86-millimeters long and 5-millimeters thick. Furthermore, the device will reportedly sustain 132Mbps read / write rates, sport random seek times of under 50-nanoseconds, and consume “less than one-third of the power used in a typical spinning HDD.” Unfortunately, there was no word on when the Windows / OS X compatible device would grace store shelves, but you can start cleaning the dust out of that PCMCIA slot now in preparation.

[Thanks, Kevin]

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BOLD MOVES: THE FUTURE OF FORD A new documentary series. Be part of the transformation as it happens in real-time

Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!

Filed under: Storage

While Toshiba’s certainly no stranger to hard drives, the company hasn’t exactly been quick to jump on the crowded portable storage bandwagon. It now looks to be doing its best to make up for lost time, however, introducing a new line of external USB hard drives boasting capacities all the way up to 200GB — apparently a first at the 2.5-inch form factor. Descriptively dubbed the Toshiba USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive, the drives also appear to be at least somewhat ruggedized, with a “special patent-pending” shock mount system and a “scratch-resistant” housing. Look for the drive to roll out in 100, 120, 160, and 200GB varieties this week, with ‘em running $130, $150, $180, and $230, respectively.

[Via AP/Yahoo News]

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BOLD MOVES: THE FUTURE OF FORD A new documentary series. Be part of the transformation as it happens in real-time

Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!

Filed under: Storage

Late last year, HP hit us up with its first venture into the world of NAS, and just as Q1 winds down and Q2 impatiently begins, the outfit is hoping to attract the attention of up and coming small business owners. The StorageWorks Media Vault Pro is one of the dozen or so products briefly (and we do mean briefly) introduced in its latest small biz lineup, and aside from the elegant image we left to stare at, we really don’t know much else. Reportedly, the drive ratchets up to 1TB in size, will ring up just under a grand, and provides the obligatory “expandable network storage and enhanced protection services” that all the competitors do, but alas, we’ve no idea when HP plans on launching these things into hectic startup offices.

[Via TGDaily]

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BOLD MOVES: THE FUTURE OF FORD A new documentary series. Be part of the transformation as it happens in real-time

Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!

Filed under: Transportation, Storage

Continuing on the path of kicking out a large variety of hard drives over the course of a couple months, Fujitsu is at it once again, and this time its the MHW2040AC getting the spotlight. The RoHS-compliant HDD looks like your everyday hard disc drive upon initial inspection, but underneath its sly facade lies an ability to function in temperatures ranging from 30 below to 85-degrees (read: near face-melting heat) Celsius. As expected, the drive is being marketed as a rugged alternative for automotive / marine uses, where the internal storage is likely to face extreme temperatures from time to time. Additionally, it can reportedly withstand “operational shock of up to 300G” while requiring just 1.8-watts of power to read and write data. No word just yet on how much this temperature resisting beast will run you, nor if it’ll ever arrive in sizes other than 40GB, but if you’re planning a relocation to Moscow or Death Valley Phoenix, the pricetag isn’t likely to matter.

[Via AkihabaraNews]

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BOLD MOVES: THE FUTURE OF FORD A new documentary series. Be part of the transformation as it happens in real-time

Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!

Filed under: Storage

Look out folks, as just one month after Buffalo cranked the NAS ante up to 3TB, we’ve got a new kid on the block holding down the mighty four-oh. MicroNet’s Platinum NAS 4.0 indeed packs a whopping 4,000GB on just four SATA hard drives, and while the company didn’t go out of its way to divulge exactly which units were stuffed within, we’ve all got our hunch. Regardless, this device also features 256MB of write-back / write-through error correcting cache memory, Windows / OS X / Linux compatibility, RAID 0/1/5 support, an Intel XScale 64-bit network storage processor, dual-channel gigabit Ethernet connectivity, a lightweight aluminum design, and it even consumes about “one-third less power” than similar alternatives. Cleverly, MicroNet only asserted that the 1TB edition would hit in Q2 for $879, but we’re confident the flagship version will tack on quite a premium for all its capaciousness.

[Via MacWorld]

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BOLD MOVES: THE FUTURE OF FORD A new documentary series. Be part of the transformation as it happens in real-time

Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!