Hasta La Gadget!

Flash memory advancements usually sing the same tune: faster, smaller and high-density. Improve one of these attributes, and you’ve go the makings of a better chip on your hands. Samsung is focusing on the latter, announcing the mass production of its 10 nanometer 128-gigabit three-bit multi-level-cell NAND flash. That mouthful translates into flash chips with more memory per cell in a small form factor. Sammy says the new chip is capable of 400Mbps, and claims the highest density in the industry. The new silicon will be used to expand the company’s supply of 128GB memory cards and high-volume solid state drives. It’s also well positioned to be a better part for devices with embedded NAND storage, which Samsung hopes will keep it competitive. You’ll find Samsung’s announcement and all the granular details after the break.

Filed under: Storage, Samsung

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Source: Samsung Tomorrow

Adobe announced some great news earlier today, stating that it had made a whopping $1.008 billion in the past 3 months. That earnings figure was about 30% higher than its anticipated $750 million earnings figure. Unfortunately, Adobe followed that good news with some terrible news. It has just announced that its Chief Technology Officer, Kevin Lynch has resigned from the company. The resignation came in the form of a SEC filing.

Adobe states that on March 22nd, Lynch will be leaving the company. It does not plan on assigning someone else to the CTO position, but will instead assign Lynch’s responsibilities to Adobe’s CEO, Shantanu Narayen, and its Senior Vice President, Bryan Lamkin. They will be taking over the technology initiatives, cross company research, and Corporate Development of the company.

So where will Lynch be moving onto? Well according to both CNBC and Adobe, Lynch will be finding a new home in Apple’s headquarters. It’s speculated that Lynch will be taking on a position on Apple’s executive team. Lynch used to do some work on Apple’s Mac software, including development for FrameMaker, as well as his work on General Magic. Lynch, nor Apple, have gone into details yet about what direction Lynch will be taking with the company.

This move will definitely be a difficult change for Adobe. Lynch came to Adobe in 2005 after the company had acquired Macromedia. He oversaw Adobe’s Research and Experience Design teams, and inspired the creation of Macromedia’s Dreamweaver as well as Macromedia’s move onto web publishing. He also guided Adobe’s Digital Marketing and Digital Media business to a vision of shared technology. Both Narayen and Lamkin have big shoes to fill.

[via CNET]

Adobe CTO Kevin Lynch moves onto Apple is written by Brian Sin & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Patriot has just announced a new addition to its collection of storage offerings called the AERO. As the name suggests, the new device is of the wireless variety, which Patriot hopes will garner favor with owners of memory-light tablets and smartphones. To reinforce this ambition, there is of course a companion app — Patriot Connect — for Android and iOS that turns the device into a mobile media hub. With hooks for 3rd party media players, it hopes to overcome any format barriers, and there’s also an internet pass through feature to let multiple users hit the web on the same IP. There are two capacities on offer — 500GB and 1TB — both with WiFi b / g / n, capacity for five connected devices, USB 3.0 and up to six hours of life on the rechargeable battery. The larger of the two will cost $199, dropping to $159 if you don’t need so much storage. Both ship in early April.

Filed under: Storage

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It’s no secret that Flash can be a security liability, with Adobe having again rolled out critical updates in recent weeks to patch vulnerabilities that left users at risk. Not every user updates when the patches are released, however, instead continuing to use an older, potential vulnerable version. In light of this, Apple has taken another step towards keeping its users safe.

Just as it did previously with Java, which is widely known for its security vulnerabilities, Apple has now blocked out-of-date Adobe Flash plugins on Safari. The change has already been implemented, and so when users attempt to access Flash content using an older version of the plugin, they will instead be present with the notification box in the screenshot above.

The user will be notified that he or she is using an outdated version of Flash, and will be provided with a link to download the latest version. Once downloaded, the Flash content will be loaded and all will be well. While some might consider this to be an inconvenience, it has been implemented in light of critical security issues with Flash Player.

On Tuesday, we reported that Adobe has rolled out an emergency update for Flash Player to patch security issues that allowed hackers to attack users running Firefox. On February 14, Adobe had also rolled out updates to its Acrobat and Reader to correct vulnerabilities that were actively being exploited in the wild.

[via ars technica]

Apple blocks out-of-date Flash Player in Safari, tells users to update is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

MacBooks are on a straightforward path to becoming closed case devices, with very little in the way of aftermarket expandability options for consumers. Which is why the Nifty MiniDrive Kickstarter project seemed so promising: It’s a microSD card adapter that fits flush with the side of your MacBook Pro or Air, which means you can add up to 64GB of additional flash storage via a port that many people probably only use very occasionally anyway.

It’d be easy to do this yourself if Apple used the kind of spring-loaded, flush-mount SD card slot you see on a lot of Windows PCs, but as it is, when using standard SD cards and adapters, the end protrudes about a third of an inch out of the side of the computer, which means keeping something there permanently will invite disaster if you’re putting it in and out of a bag with any frequency. The Nifty MiniDrive fixes that, with a design that’s custom-fit for the different models of MacBook (there’s an Air version, one for the MacBook Pro and another for the 15-inch Retina Pro).

Removing the card requires a special tool that Nifty ships with each MiniDrive, which is not unlike a SIM-card tray ejector, but with a hook so that it can catch the recessed groove found on the adapter itself. It’s a remarkably effective design, which works well in practice. Losing a MiniDrive tool would mean your drive is stuck in the SD card slot, but you can fashion your own removal tool from a staple or paper clip should it ever come to that, so it isn’t a huge concern. Plus, these are designed to be used mostly by people who don’t require frequent access to that port anyways.

As you can now get microSD cards in capacities ranging up to 64GB, with 128GB possibly to follow soon, that adds a considerable amount of extra disk space in a package that adds almost no weight to your existing setup, and doesn’t change the outside physical profile of your machine. On my 128GB MacBook Air, the Nifty MiniDrive with a $60 64GB microSD Class 10 card gives me 50 percent more storage. And if I fill it up, it’s easy enough to swap out another drive, keeping the first microSD card close at hand in case I need to retrieve something from the archive.

Although only made of plastic and glue (plus the metal connectors), the two Nifty MiniDrives (one for 15-inch Retina Mac and one for 13-inch Air) I have are performing well. They’ve survived multiple removals without incident, the silver finish on their endcaps matches the color of the MacBook’s aluminum case perfectly, and OS X instantly recognizes the drives when inserted. In an age of Wi-Fi cameras and mostly cramped SSD storage, they’re a great little addition to any Mac notebook setup, and should be available to order soon from Nifty’s website.