Archive for the ‘Storage’ Category

Interestingly, after losing big in the format war Microsoft is now predicting that the future of digital media distribution is in downloads not disc storage. Remember Microsoft was one of the major backers of the HD DVD format that was designed to replace DVDs but last month lost to Sony’s Blu-ray. Microsoft had already released an HD DVD drive for their XBox 360 platform which is as good as an AOL diskette at the moment. Instead of embracing the winning format, Microsoft will instead focus on distributing content over the XBox Live Video Marketplace because as Microsoft’s European boss, Chris Lewis said about the timeline for digital media distribution dominance, “I think that’s going to be the case in the next 12-18 months.” Sure, if you say so!

Hitatchi announced today that they will start shipping the Travelstar 5K320 HDD for portable computers. The new drive has a maximum 320GB capacity and built-in data encryption capabilities. The 2.5-inch, 5400 rpm, SATA drive can also sustain 400Gs of shock protection. Just to make sure that we all understand what the latter means, the 5K320 can continue to operate flawlessly under accelerations that are 400 times that of the acceleration at sea level on Earth (1G). It sounds like a touch of over-engineering but who am I to judge? Other than the shock protection, the HDD also comes equipped with altitude-sensing Thermal Fly-height Control and “the Phoenix FailSafe theft-deterrence service, PC owners can track, remotely disable and securely erase the hard drive.“ Anyone with lots of sensitive data to protect and making the mistake of storing said data on a laptop then he better invest in one of Hitachi’s Travelstar 5K320; he won’t regret it!

What can one expect from a small form factor hard drive pioneer such as Toshiba anything else other than even smaller devices? Not much other than announcing two new 1.8-inch SATA hard drives. The drives designed for mobile PCs come in 80GB and 120GB capacities. Toshiba says and one expects that the new and very tiny HDDs will find their way inside ultra-portable devices offering the high performance of their 2.5-inch series of SATA hard drives. Other than very small, the new drives are also very light weighing only 62 grams and come with 8MB of on-board cache while delivering 489 Mbits/sec data transfer performance.

After the death declaration of the HD DVD format (after everyone, including Toshiba gave up on it) showing preference for Sony-backed Blu-ray, Microsoft seemed determined to continue support for HD DVD especially considering that a $130 drive was available for their XBox 360 game console. Last weekend, even Microsoft announced that they will stop selling the HD DVD drive for the XBox. The company said that they will continue to provide technical support for the units already sold. They have said nothing about supporting Blu-ray while they announced their confidence that the sales of their game console will not be impacted by this turn of events. All I have to say is the Playstation 3 owners will certainly be out on the Internet in force celebrating their victory over hated Microsoft.

If you are looking for a stylish and limited edition USB Flash drive that will earn you the respect of your colleagues and friends then look no further than Mimoco’s mimobot Star Wars Flash drives. The drives coming in capacities of 1GB, 2GB, and 4GB. Each drive is modeled after one of the most popular characters in Star Wars including Princess Leia, Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, Darth Vader, and R2-D2 among a few others. Finally, since these are limited edition USB Flash drivers, you better hurry if you want to own one. Some have already sold out!

Toshiba announced today that they will stop production of HD DVD essentially ending the format war with rival Blu-ray. Wall-Mart’s decision to focus only on selling Blu-ray devices following other large retailers such as Best Buy and online video rental service NetFlix put the last nail on the HD DVD coffin. Toshiba will be taking a huge loss having to stop production of all HD DVD players and recorders. Microsoft is also likely to get hurt by this move since HD DVD is their format of choice for the Xbox 360; those who purchased a Sony PS3 and a Blu-ray peripheral made the better choice. Toshiba’s move will likely spell good news for consumers who can now buy the next generation players without fear of them becoming obsolete overnight since the format war has ended. Higher demand will also lead to a reduction of prices for the players which until now have remained high because of the two formats.

South Korean Mtronstorage Technology Co. has developed and will start producing in April a new 1.8-inch super-high capacity Solid State Drive (SSD). Mtron already sells 2.5-inch SSD’s with a 32GB capacity but this latest addition sure makes them stand out compared to their competition. This high capacity SSD will find its way into portable computers as a replacement for regular hard drives providing all the benefits of SSD storage without loss in maximum capacity. The only problem is that the 1.8-inch SSD will be a little bit too expensive at first. The company expects to sell it at $1600 when it hits the market after it goes to production in April. This is well over what I can afford but SSDs are the future and so expect prices to drop sharply over the next few years. In the meantime, some of us can only dream of owning one of these high capacity, miniature SSDs.

Oakley’s Kitchen Sink Pack lives up to its name being a backpack designed to carry everything but the kitchen sink as the saying goes. I should note, that this backpack is truly named the Kitchen Sink Pack and it is not a characterization on my part. This large backpack has room for your mobile phone and your laptop (up to 17-inch laptops fit this pack) and many other compartments for storing your eyewear, iPod (and its accessories) along with the main storage area that can hold your books or any other supplies you are carrying with you especially if you are camping or hiking. The Kitchen Sink Pack will set you back $175 but if you are looking for a well designed and high capacity backpack then you will be getting your money’s worth with Oakley’s offering.

This new little USB storage device has all the features of a conventional USB flash drive, such as 1 GB of memory, made to easily transport files from one computer to another. However, this particular USB device adds some less common features, which make it a little more useful, and also a little more costly. Opposite the USB port is a rubber eraser which can conveniently be used for erasing wrong numbers and information. Plus, rather than a plain plastic colored case, this fancy little USB drive has a shell of lacquered teak wood to give it a more professional appearance.

Riding the tails of the successful Transformers movie over the summer comes a 1GB flash drive sporting an Autobot insignia. This 1GB memory stick connects to your PC using USB 2.0. The main problem I see is its small size (1GB). Lets just hope this drive can transform into a 4, 8 even a 16gb stick because 1gb just isn’t cutting it anymore. For more info check out the Product Page.