Tag Archives: storage

WD’s 320GB My Passport AV external HDD wants to have and hold your media

Western Digital has played this card before with the strategically named My DVR Expander , but for those who don't realize that an external hard drive is an external hard drive, there's the My Passport AV. For all intents and purposes, this 320GB HDD is nothing more than a standard drive with a fancy marketing scheme following it closely. Oh, sure -- it may work "seamlessly" with Sony's Direct Copy feature on the outfit's range of Handycam camcorders, but outside of that, we don't see anything in particular that makes us long to pay more for something that doesn't really do more than any other 320GB HDD on shelves today. If you're in complete opposition (it's cool... really), it's available to order today for $109.99. WD's 320GB My Passport AV external HDD wants to have and hold your media originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 10 Mar 2010 16:59:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Posted in Technology | Also tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Connecting the Quantum Dots to More Than Double Hard Drive Capacity [Science]

Scientists have developed a new type of semiconductor structure—using microscopic crystals called magnetic quantum dots —that could more than double current hard drive storage capacity. That's just for starters. The crystals themselves aren't new; they've been around for over a decade in computer chips, solar cells, and LEDs, according to CBC News . This particular application, though, is unprecedented: The new work, reported today in the journal Nature Materials, describes a class of quantum dots that not only control electrons, but also have good magnetic properties allowing them to read the electron's spin. The research team claims it's the first successful synthesis of magnetic quantum dots above room temperature. The breakthrough came after two years of research, when the team was able to get the right concentration of manganese combined with the germanium matrix of the quantum dot. Makes perfect sense! But however high-level the science, the end result is clear: a new breed of semiconductor could be on the way, bringing with it speed, efficiency, and storage increases bordering on the exponential. The only question now is how long? [ CBC News ]
Posted in Technology | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Strobeshnik: probably the most awesome hard drive clock of all time

Turning aged hard drives into clocks has been a common occurrence for years now , but there's still something magical about this rendition. Designed and crafted by Svofski, the Strobeshnik relies on the stroboscopic effect to create the illusion of a persistent numeric display. The HDD platter itself has ten digits, colon and dash marks cut all the way through it, and by carefully timing the light strobes, the illusion is perfected. Check out a video of the startup just below the break -- and be patient, the payoff is spectacularly sweet. Continue reading Strobeshnik: probably the most awesome hard drive clock of all time Strobeshnik: probably the most awesome hard drive clock of all time originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 07 Mar 2010 22:48:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Posted in Technology | Also tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

CeBIT Remainders: 8 Reasons We Didn’t Go [Remainders]

Every year, Hanover, Germany hosts hordes of tech journalists, analysts, and PR people for CeBIT. It's like CES , sort of, except further away, and more boring. We decided not to go this year; it ends tomorrow. Here's what we missed! To be clear, these were some of the bigger stories of the conference, at least for American audiences. We've written a few other CeBIT stories up as well, which you can find here , but by and large, the event just sort of came and went. So, this is what was happening over in Hanover this week, while the rest of the tech world was going about their business. Pierre Cardin Tablet : Wikipedia tells me that Pierre Cardin is a "Italian-born French fashion designer" who is famous for his "space age" clothing designs. He's paired up with a small Taiwanese OEM to make a tablet—the old foldy kind, not the slate-like new kind. It's pink, and it will cost $450, if it ever hits stores in the US. ASUS EeeTop ET2010PNT and ET2010AGT On the exterior, ASUS EeeTops are basically a budget take on the AIO concept you're familiar with from the likes of the iMac and HP's Touchsmarts. On the interior, as with most ASUS products, they're incomprehensible parts soup. Shuttle I-Power External GPU : Breaking news, for people who would like to buy a box that's nearly the size of a netbook and which can help boost their notebook's graphics capabilities! (But only certain notebooks, because you need a special adapter!) The Shuttle I-Power External GPU is ready to accommodate your fantasies. 1Cross B'ook ereader: Entourage eDGe on a budget : The first step here is to try to remember what the Entourage eDGe is. Now that you've done that, the second step is to figure out why you care about this cheaper, gaudier, and somehow less practical take on the same concept. Intel Atom for Storage Devices : Intel's Atom processors, traditionally meant for netbooks and cheap laptops, are about as unglamorous as tech products get. I'd even hold that this was true five minutes ago, which was before I'd even heard about the Intel Atom for storage devices , which is a special version of the platform for household and small business network storage devices. New Intel Classmate : Intel's ultra-budget Classmate convertible tablet PCs are evolving! (Slightly!) Here is the reference design for the newest one, which is quite similar to earlier reference designs on the outside, but adjusted slightly for cost and performance reason on the inside. LG 12x Blu-ray drives : Did LG not have 12x Blu-ray writers before? Are these just new versions of their old Blu-ray devices? Such are the mysteries of CeBIT, which could easily be solved, if anyone cared enough to Google for backlinks. ASUS O!Play USB 3.0 : We're big fans of the ASUS O!Play set-top boxes around here and we're not very slightly more enamored with the concept, now that it supports USB 3.0.
Posted in Technology | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Corsair’s Force Series SSDs Are the Fastest in Its Class With 280MB/s Reads [Ssd]

These Force Series SSDs from Corsair have up to 280MB/s reads and 260MB/s writes, which are supposedly "class-leading". Even if it's not the fastest solid state drives on the market period, it's the fastest Corsair's ever made. The drives will be available in 100 and 200GB sizes in about two weeks, and will support SATA II 3.0Gb/s. No prices for these yet, but our guess is you're going to have to pay a little more for the higher performance. In comparison, Corsair's other 128GB drives run around $400-500, depending on where you shop. [ Corsair ]
Posted in Technology | Also tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Corsair Force gives us another SandForce-controlled SSD speed demon

Seriously, if you're shopping for an SSD and don't know the name SandForce yet, you're not doing it right. The producer of what looks to be the consensus fastest controller on the market is spreading its wings today with a new drive announced by Corsair that offers its SF-1200 chip and capacities of either 100GB or 200GB. The Force follows swiftly in the wake of the Nova and Reactor series and represents Corsair's new flagship device in this space. It'll offer the generous consumer a sweet 280MBps read and 260MBps write speeds (yes, those are mega bytes we're talking about), "class-leading random read/write performance," and the requisite Trim support to ensure it maintains that performance in the long run. A specific price is not yet known, but these are expected out within the next couple of weeks. Corsair Force gives us another SandForce-controlled SSD speed demon originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 04 Mar 2010 06:37:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Posted in Technology | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

WD’s first SiliconEdge Blue SSD launches, gets reviewed

Remember when Western Digital picked up SiliconSystems for a song during the height of last decade's Great Recession? Here we are a year later looking at the first fruit of that relationship, as WD has just introduced its first consumer-oriented solid state drive in the SiliconEdge Blue and its enterprise-ready SiliconDrive N1x. Both 2.5-inch families feature a native SATA 3.0Gbps interface along with read speeds as high as 240 - 250MB/sec and write rates peaking at around 140 - 150MB/sec, and the former has already hit the test bench on a number of occasions. For those considering the upgrade, you should probably dive into those links below -- most everyone came away feeling that the SiliconEdge Blue was a wee bit underwhelming for the price, with Hot Hardware noting that the "Micron C300 and Intel X25-M were measurably faster overall," and the lofty MSRP just left 'em looking for more. Here's hoping for a price drop and / or a SiliconEdge Black , eh? WD's first SiliconEdge Blue SSD launches, gets reviewed originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 03 Mar 2010 12:29:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Posted in Technology | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Apple Patents Cockpunching All Smart Phones: An Illustrated Guide [Apple]

Here's the full lawsuit Apple's filed against HTC , alleging infringements on 20 patents "related to the iPhone's user interface, underlying architecture and hardware." They're a doozy. U.S. PATENT NO. 7,362,331 Time-based, non-constant translation of user interface objects between states The present invention relates to a method for moving objects within the graphical user interface (GUI) of an operating system in a manner that provides a transitional effect between window states, which is pleasing to the user. This transitional effect includes changing the shape of a window while scaling and moving the window between two different sizes and positions. In one embodiment of the present invention, the transitional effect may be employed as a window is minimized into an icon, or restored from an icon. In another embodiment of the present invention, the transitional effect is employed as a window is minimized within its title bar, or restored therefrom. The rate of movement of objects is controlled in a non-linear manner, to further enhance the pleasing effect. U.S. PATENT NO. 7,479,949 Touch screen device, method, and graphical user interface for determining commands by applying heuristics A computer-implemented method for use in conjunction with a computing device with a touch screen display comprises: detecting one or more finger contacts with the touch screen display, applying one or more heuristics to the one or more finger contacts to determine a command for the device, and processing the command. The one or more heuristics comprise: a heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a one-dimensional vertical screen scrolling command, a heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a two-dimensional screen translation command, and a heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a command to transition from displaying a respective item in a set of items to displaying a next item in the set of items. U.S. PATENT NO. 7,657,849 Unlocking a device by performing gestures on an unlock image A device with a touch-sensitive display may be unlocked via gestures performed on the touch-sensitive display. The device is unlocked if contact with the display corresponds to a predefined gesture for unlocking the device. The device displays one or more unlock images with respect to which the predefined gesture is to be performed in order to unlock the device. The performance of the predefined gesture with respect to the unlock image may include moving the unlock image to a predefined location and/or moving the unlock image along a predefined path. The device may also display visual cues of the predefined gesture on the touch screen to remind a user of the gesture. U.S. PATENT NO. 7,469,381 List scrolling and document translation, scaling, and rotation on a touch-screen display In accordance with some embodiments, a computer-implemented method for use in conjunction with a device with a touch screen display is disclosed. In the method, a movement of an object on or near the touch screen display is detected. In response to detecting the movement, an electronic document displayed on the touch screen display is translated in a first direction. If an edge of the electronic document is reached while translating the electronic document in the first direction while the object is still detected on or near the touch screen display, an area beyond the edge of the document is displayed. In response to detecting that the object is no longer on or near the touch screen display, the document is translated in a second direction until the area beyond the edge of the document is no longer displayed. U.S. PATENT NO. 5,920,726 System and method for managing power conditions within a digital camera device Digital cameras and methods that provide for a rapid camera power-on sequence. A warm-sleep state is defined in which the camera and nearly all of its internal components are shut down, yet just enough information is retained within high speed volatile storage and processing units to rapidly return the camera to full operating state. The warm-sleep state is managed to consume a minimum amount of power to keep the vital information intact. Upon receipt of a power-on indication, the camera then transitions from the warm-sleep state to full operation by simply activating the processing units, and continuing operation from the state it was in immediately prior to the power-off request. U.S. PATENT NO. 7,633,076 Automated response to and sensing of user activity in portable devices The various methods and devices described herein relate to devices which, in at least certain embodiments, may include one or more sensors for providing data relating to user activity and at least one processor for causing the device to respond based on the user activity which was determined, at least in part, through the sensors. The response by the device may include a change of state of the device, and the response may be automatically performed after the user activity is determined. U.S. PATENT NO. 7,383,453 Automated response to and sensing of user activity in portable devices One embodiment of the present invention provides a system that facilitates reducing static power consumption of a processor. During operation, the system receives a signal indicating that instruction execution within the processor is to be temporarily halted. In response to this signal, the system halts an instruction- processing portion of the processor, and reduces the voltage supplied to the instruction-processing portion of the processor. Full voltage is maintained to a remaining portion of the processor, so that the remaining portion of the processor can continue to operate while the instruction-processing portion of the processor is in reduced power mode. U.S. PATENT NO. 5,455,599 Object-oriented graphic system An object-oriented graphic system is disclosed including a processor with an attached display, storage and object-oriented operating system. The graphic system builds a component object in the storage of the processor for managing graphic processing. The processor includes an object for connecting one or more graphic devices to various objects responsible for tasks such as graphic accelerators, frame buffers, page description languages, and vector engines. The system is fully extensible and includes polymorphic processing built into each of the support objects. U.S. PATENT NO. 5,848,105 Object-oriented graphic system A method and apparatus for separating and removing distortion from interfering co-channel signals and suppressing adjacent-channel interfering signals of the Gaussian Minimum-Shift Keyed (GMSK) or other MSK type with filtering structures that exploit the cyclostationarity of the received GMSK or other MSK signals in order to accommodate a greater number (or the same number, but with greater quality) of transmitted signals received by one or more antennas than can be accommodated by existing filters. The parameters in these filtering structures are adapted by either of two adaptation apparatus that exploit both the known training sequence that is transmitted in most wireless communications systems, and the constant modulus property exhibited by each of the transmitted GMSK or other MSK signals. U.S. PATENT NO. 6,424,354 Object-oriented event notification system with listener registration of both interests and methods An event notification system for propagating object-change information. The notification system supports change notification without queues in an object-based application or operating system and can be scaled to propagate large numbers of events among a large plurality of objects. The event notification system interconnects a plurality of event source and event receiver objects. Any object, such as a command object, may operate as either an event receiver object, an event source object or both. A notification object is created by a source object to transport, from a source to a receiver, descriptive information about a change, which includes a particular receiver object method and a pointer to the source object that sent the notification. A receiver object must register with a connection object its "interest" in receiving notification of changes; specifying both the event type and the particular source object of interest. After establishing such connections, the receiver object receives only the events of the specified type for the source objects "of interest" and no others. This delegation of event selection avoids central event queuing altogether and so limits receiver object event processing that the invention can be scaled to large systems operating large numbers of objects.
Posted in Technology | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

SSDs gone wild at CeBIT: Plextor reveals its first, Xtreem-S1 peeks out and OCZ teases external Enyo USB 3.0

Man, it's been a white hot minute since we've heard the good word from Plextor . Today, all that changes. After sticking to the relatively boring optical media market for years, said outfit has finally realized that there's money to be made in flash storage. The PX-64M1S (64GB) and the PX-128M1S (128GB) are the company's first-ever SSDs, both of which arrive in 2.5-inch form factors and use an integrated SATA II interface. As for transfers, you'll see sequential read rates as high as 110MB/sec and 130MB/sec, while sequential write rates hit 65MB/sec and 70MB/sec (respectively in both cases). Both units can be snapped up now for $225 (64GB) / $400 (128GB). In related news, OCZ is using CeBIT as a springboard for the launch of its external Enyo USB 3.0 SSD; unfortunately, details surrounding capacity, price and pretty much anything else are being left out, but you can bet we'll be hounding its booth representatives for those and reporting back. Finally, Team Xtreem is dishing out a 250GB Xtreem-S1 SSD with a Sandforce processor and read / write rates of around 260MB/sec, though models will be available in 60GB and 120GB as well. Peek the source links for all the nitty-gritty details, and stay tuned for more from Hannover. SSDs gone wild at CeBIT: Plextor reveals its first, Xtreem-S1 peeks out and OCZ teases external Enyo USB 3.0 originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 01 Mar 2010 16:23:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Posted in Technology | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Western Digital My Passport Studio Drives, Now With E-Paper [Storage]

Don't expect to read a book on 'em, but Western Digital's latest My Passport Studio hard drives feature a customizable e-paper display that stays on even when the drive is unplugged. (e-paper is all the rage in external drives lately, and we've already seen Western Digital make the upgrade in their larger externals .) Aside from the display, the My Passport Studios are preformatted for Macs (though they'll run just fine on a PC with a reformat), connect over USB or FireWire 800 and range in price from $150 (for 320GB) to $200 (for 640GB). They're available now. [ Western Digital ] WD(R) Introduces New My Passport(TM) Studio(TM) Portable Drives, Delivering Super-Fast, Go-Anywhere Performance for Mac(R) Computers E-Label Smart Display Helps Creative Professionals Organize Their Storage LAKE FOREST, Calif., March 1 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — WD® (NYSE: WDC), the world's leader in external storage solutions, today introduced its new My Passport™ Studio™ portable drives featuring the super-fast FireWire® 800 interface and a customizable e-label that's always visible, even when the drive is unplugged. Sporting a sleek and stylish design, the new high-performance My Passport Studio drives are formatted for Mac® computers, compatible with Apple® TimeMachine® software, and feature automatic and continuous backup with WD SmartWare™ software, and 256-bit hardware-based encryption. Available now at select retailers and shopwd.com, the new My Passport Studio drives are offered in capacities of 320 GB, 500 GB and 640 GB. WD's My Passport Studio drives are designed for creative professionals and Mac enthusiasts. Their production and use of many large files require the fast transfers from computer to My Passport Studio drives that FireWire 800 provides. Professionals such as photographers also benefit from the e-labeling system to effectively organize their work. The e-label smart display on the front of the My Passport drives can be changed as often as desired using the included WD SmartWare software. Users can easily create a label to personalize their drive or remind themselves of its contents. The e-label also shows available capacity and whether the drive is locked. Utilizing e-paper technology, the information on the display remains clearly visible, even when the drive is unplugged. According to research firm Parks Associates, the average U.S. broadband household currently has over 120 GB of digital media and files which is projected to grow to over 1 TB of data by 2013. "Many of our customers store their content on multiple external drives, making it difficult to know what content is on each drive," said Dale Pistilli, vice president of marketing of WD's Branded Products group. "The e-label smart display is an elegant and practical solution for organizing and keeping track of one's digital life and work. WD SmartWare software makes it easy for users to protect their valuable content with automatic and continuous backup and encryption." The new My Passport Studio is fully compatible with Apple TimeMachine software for easy backup of your most important files. It also offers the option of the simple and intuitive WD SmartWare software, with automatic continuous backup and real-time visual interface, giving users a reassuring view of their backup as it happens. After the first backup, users' files are backed up automatically every time they change or add a file. My Passport Studio drives also feature user-selected password protection combined with 256-bit hardware-based encryption, which scrambles files before they are stored. Typically found only on much more expensive drive systems, the encryption acts as a virtual padlock to keep users' data safe. Price and Availability The new My Passport Studio drives are offered in capacities of 320 GB, 500 GB and 640 GB and have a 3-year limited warranty. My Passport Studio ultra-portable drives are available now at select retailers and online at shopwd.com. MSRP for the My Passport Studio drives ranges from $149.99 USD to $199.99 USD depending on capacity. My Passport Studio The new WD My Passport Studio ultra-portable drives feature: * Smart display – a customizable e-label that reminds users of what is stored on the drive and provides available capacity and security status at a glance even when the drive is unplugged; * FireWire 800 – users can save and access data at top speeds with the high-performance FireWire 800 interface; * Plug-and-play, designed for use with Mac computers and compatibility with Apple TimeMachine software; * WD SmartWare software that visually presents consumers' data in a software control center; * 256-bit hardware-based encryption and password protection for peace of mind knowing that data is protected from unauthorized access; * USB 2.0 interface – for convenience and compatibility among multiple computers; * Planet-friendly packaging derived from recycled materials to minimize waste; * HFS+ Journaled formatting and are compatible with Mac OS X Tiger®, Leopard® and Snow Leopard®; and, * 3-year limited warranty. WD SmartWare Software WD SmartWare software features: * Visual backup displays that show content in categories and shows the progress of backup; * Automatic, continuous data backup will instantly make a second copy whenever you add or change a file; * Retrieve valuable data to its original location whether it's lost data or the file has been overwritten; and, * Customizable data backup that allows users to set drive security, run diagnostics, manage the power settings, and more from the WD SmartWare control center.
Posted in Technology | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment