Hasta La Gadget!

Look out, world — Seagate‘s got a new portable hard drive comin’ your way, and it’s as capacious as ever. If you’ll recall, Western Digital broke the 1TB mark in the diminutive 2.5-inch drive sector back in July of last year, and now we’re seeing a 50 percent boost with the 1.5TB FreeAgent GoFlex ultra-portable drive. The company’s claims that this is a first of its kind, and we certainly aren’t in the mood to argue. It’s designed to play nice with both Macs and PCs (it’s formatted as NTFS), and better still, it’s all set up to take advantage of that shiny new USB 3.0 port on your shiny new laptop. As with the other GoFlex gear, this one also has a removable dongle on the bottom for docking (with an optional GoFlex Net or GoFlex TV HD, naturally), and as with some of the company’s past drives, you’ll also find an assortment of 20 Paramount Pictures movies that can be unlocked via license key online. She’s available in every color you could imagine so long as it’s black, and it can be yours for the tidy sum of $249.99.

Continue reading Seagate issues industry’s first 1.5TB external 2.5-inch HDD: FreeAgent GoFlex USB 3.0

Seagate issues industry’s first 1.5TB external 2.5-inch HDD: FreeAgent GoFlex USB 3.0 originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 21 Sep 2010 08:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Taking a note from Clickfree, are we Memorex? The company that continually attempts to blow everyone away is back with its latest gust, Mirror for Photos. It’s an odd name for an external hard drive, particularly when you realize that it functions nothing like bona fide photo backup drives that are designed to tether to your DSLR. At any rate, this here drive ships with software (PC and Mac compatible, in case you’re curious) that instructs the HDD to backup to a host machine as soon as it’s plugged in. Sounds great in theory, but we’ve always found it superbly annoying to try and halt those automated processes when you’re just trying to drag and drop a critical meeting file while darting out the door. The unit itself measures in at 3- x 5- x 0.5-inches and gets all the power it needs from a USB connection; it’s on sale today at Toys R Us (yeah, seriously) for $79.99 (320GB) / $99.99 (500GB) / $119.99 (640GB).

Continue reading Memorex intros Mirror for Photos external HDD, dares you to skip a backup

Memorex intros Mirror for Photos external HDD, dares you to skip a backup originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 18 Sep 2010 07:32:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Decisions, decisions. The $200 price range tends to be reserved for happy shiny smartphones in our minds nowadays, but spare a thought for the demure hard drive as well. Imation‘s just announced an overhaul of its Apollo line of external plate spinners, with the headliner being the Expert D300 unit you see above. Accompanied by its very own detachable stand and backup software, this $220 USB 3.0 drive promises oodles of room and a decent turn of speed as well. Set for an October launch, it’ll find lower price points for archivists with needs closer to 500GB or 1TB in size, and there’s also a selection of classically minded USB 2.0 HDDs for the more frugal among you — learn more about them in the full press release after the break.

Continue reading Imation Apollo D300 pairs 2TB of storage with USB 3.0 connection for $220

Imation Apollo D300 pairs 2TB of storage with USB 3.0 connection for $220 originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 16 Sep 2010 00:10:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Intel’s Light Peak isn’t setting any new speed records at IDF 2010 — it’s still rated at 10Gbps for now — but the optical data transfer system is finally looking like it might appear in some actual products. As you can see immediately above, a Light Peak to HDMI converter has shrunk considerably since May, and a number of optically-infused sample products were on display at Intel’s Light Peak booth. Compal’s got a laptop with the optical interconnect built in, while Western Digital showed an external hard drive, from which the Compal could pull and edit multimedia in real-time using a Light Peak-enabled Avid rackmount. Meanwhile, LaCie showed off what appeared to be a 4big Quadra RAID array with two Light Peak ports catapulting high-definition video content at 770MB/s to a nearby Samsung TV, though we should warn you that the TV itself was a bit of a hack job, and not a collaboration with Samsung — note the big, honking EVGA video card sticking out of the back. Though obviously a good bit of work went into these prototypes, Intel reps told us none would necessarily become a reality. Either way, don’t expect to see Light Peak products until sometime next year.

Intel’s Light Peak optical interconnect shrinks slightly, LaCie, WD, Compal and Avid begin prototyping originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 14 Sep 2010 07:19:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Carry all your data with you. LaCie has just introduced Minimus and the Rikiki, both small USB 3.0 drives. The Rikiki transfers data at 5GB per second, proving that you don’t have to sacrifice performance for mobility. The Minimus is larger, but offers more storage.

Both cases offer a sturdy brushed aluminum shell (which not only looks good but protects from drops, offers improved heat dissipation, and is fully recyclable). Also, both come with LaCie’s Software Suite for easy backups on both Windows and Macintosh computers.

The Rikiki is available in 500GB and 1TB capacities starting at $99.99. The Minimus is available in 1TB/2TB capacities starting at $129.99. Both are available now.