Hasta La Gadget!

Toshiba has a spanking new ‘poster boy’ when it comes to media storage on your computers, and we are talking about the Toshiba Hybrid Drive. Also known as the MQ01ABDH series, it is said to deliver a careful balance of performance which you can find in solid state disks (SSDs) with the advantage of capacity and cost-effectiveness of hard disk drives (HDDs), sporting capacities up to 1TB. The new SATA Toshiba Hybrid Drive measures 2.5” in size, and is a mere 9.5mm in height, where it boasts of “self-learning” caching algorithms which will learn the system user’s data access patterns in order to optimize performance.

These self-learning caching algorithms also help manage just which particular user data is stored to the NAND Flash for a quicker response down the road, as well as how the data in the NAND Flash will be updated based on intelligent access pattern learning. Interested parties will be able to select from 750GB and 1TB capacities, where they should start making waves in standard-sized notebooks, gaming PCs, all-in-one and slimline desktops and other digital computing applications. [Press Release]

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Toshiba Introduces X-gale Series SSDs For MacBook Air Form Factor Devices, Toshiba HDD Platters Get 2.5Tb Of Data On Every Square Inch,

LaCie’s no stranger to kicking out portable HDDs that are a-okay with getting kicked around, and the Rugged USB 3.0 Thunderbolt Series is no exception. As the extended title implies, this one is equipped to transfer files via USB 3.0 or Thunderbolt, and it’ll play nice with Mac and Windows platforms. The LaCie Rugged SSD offers up transfer rates as high as 380MB/sec — a feat we came darn close to hitting ourselves in testing — and the HDD variants claim up to 110MB/sec. The bantam drive is entirely bus-powered, and it’s engineered to shake off drops of up to four feet. Interesting? Both models should be shipping shortly, with the 1TB HDD edition going for $249.99 and the 120GB SSDer for $199.99.

Continue reading LaCie’s Rugged USB 3.0 Thunderbolt: fast portable storage that can take a beating

Filed under: Storage

LaCie’s Rugged USB 3.0 Thunderbolt: fast portable storage that can take a beating originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 25 Sep 2012 11:30:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  LaCie  | Email this | Comments

It’s difficult to thrive in the solid-state drive world. Unless you’ve got just the right controller and flash memory, most performance-minded PC users will rarely give you a second glance. Samsung muscled its way into that narrow view with the SSD 830 last year; it intends to lock our attention with the new SSD 840 and SSD 840 Pro. The Pro’s 520MB/s and 450MB/s sequential read and write speeds are only modest bumps over the 830, but they don’t tell the whole story of just how fast it gets. The upgraded MDX controller boosts the random read access to a nicely rounded 100,000IOPS, and random writes have more than doubled to 78,000IOPS or 90,000IOPS, depending on who you ask and what drive you use. The improved performance in either direction is a useful boost to on-the-ground performance, as both AnandTech and Storage Review will tell you. We’re waiting on details of the ordinary triple level cell-based 840 model beyond its 120GB, 250GB and 500GB capacities, although there won’t be an enormous premium for the multi-level cell 840 Pro over existing drives when it arrives in mid-October — the flagship line should start at $100 for a basic 64GB drive, and peak at $600 for the ultimate 512GB version.

Filed under: Storage

Samsung SSD 840 Pro caters to speed seekers with faster random access originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 24 Sep 2012 21:16:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink AnandTech, Storage Review  |  Samsung Tomorrow  | Email this | Comments

What’s this? Just another USB 3.0 thumbdrive at IDF 2012? Not quite. You’re looking at Kingston’s DataTraveler Workspace, a storage device that incorporates bona fide SSD technology not usually found in thumbdrives — like a bunch of ultra speedy flash memory and a SandForce controller that supports TRIM and S.M.A.R.T commands. As such, it shares more in common with Kingston’s line of SSDs. It’s not really designed for data storage — instead, it’s meant to be used as a certified Windows To Go fixed drive, “a fully manageable corporate Windows 8 workspace on a specially configured, bootable USB drive”.

The idea is that corporate IT can deploy these thumbdrives to employees who can then run a secure, managed instance of Windows on a variety of PCs with a bootable USB 2.0 (or faster) port. Another interesting feature of Windows To Go is that Kingston’s DT Workspace thumbdrives can be removed for up to 1 minute without crashing Windows — the OS simply alerts the user to “keep the USB drive plugged in” and continues where it left off. Pricing remains a mystery, but the device will be available for business customers in 32, 64 and 128GB capacities when Windows 8 launches. Until then, you’re invited to peek at the gallery below and to watch our hands-on video past the break.

Continue reading Hands-on with Kingston’s DataTraveler Workspace at IDF (video)

Filed under: Misc, Storage

Hands-on with Kingston’s DataTraveler Workspace at IDF (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 17 Sep 2012 06:07:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

Looking to save some coin on your tech purchases? Of course you are! In this round-up, we’ll run down a list of the freshest frugal buys, hand-picked with the help of the folks at SlickDeals. You’ll want to act fast, though, as many of these offerings won’t stick around long.

If you’re itching to take matters into your own hands, perhaps building a new work machine from the ground up can fill said desire. In today’s list of links, you’ll find a few of solid buys that will help you do just that. Just in case your current mouse just isn’t cutting it or has just kicked the bucket, we’ve got a couple frugal options for replacements in that department as well. So, let’s get right to it. Head on past the break for a fresh batch of links ready to meet your eager clicks, but be mindful of those pesky rebate forms and coupon codes.

Continue reading SlickDeals’ best in tech for September 12th: Logitech Mice, SSDs and more

Filed under: Misc, Peripherals, Storage

SlickDeals’ best in tech for September 12th: Logitech Mice, SSDs and more originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 12 Sep 2012 12:40:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  SlickDeals  | Email this | Comments