Hasta La Gadget!

OCZ Technology seems to always be toiling away on new solid state drives, but it’s rare to find any from the company that are priced for the average Joe / Jane. Rather than aiming specifically for the fat-walleted enthusiast crowd, the Agility series is hoping to make a decent sized splash in the mainstream market. These 2.5-inch SATA II SSDs promise 230MB/sec read and 135MB/sec write speeds, along with 64MB of cache and a two-year warranty. We pinged OCZ for details surrounding pricing and availability, so here’s the dirt: the trio of models will be available in a fortnight or so for $129.99 (30GB), $219.99 (60GB) and $349.99 (120GB).

Filed under: Storage

OCZ intros 2.5-inch Agility SSD line: 120GB for $349.99 originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 10 Jun 2009 20:08:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Is it possible that Eye-Fi could make its range of geo-tagging’, Wi-Fi sharin’ cards any more useful? We didn’t think so, but it turns out we were dead wrong. The company has today released the Eye-Fi Pro, a 4GB SD card with a couple of very handy new features.

First, the cards finally support RAW files. Previously, only jpeg images could be geo-tagged and sent over Wi-Fi, but now you can use it with proper images. Next, and possibly more important for some, is that the cards work with ad-hoc Wi-Fi networks. This means that you no longer need a Wi-Fi router to get connected — if you set up an ad-hoc network using your laptop, for instance, then the Eye-Fi Pro can connect direct. Handy for wireless tethered shooting away from power outlets.

Eye-Fi has another new trick, one which will apply to all its cards via the Eye-Fi manager. You know the lock feature on the camera, the one which lets you protect a photo against deletion? Now it’s actually useful. Lock a file and Eye-Fi will engage in Selective Transfer, which in English means you can choose which photos get transferred. This is particularly useful with huge RAW files.

I have a question for the you, the readers. I’m thinking of picking up an Eye-Fi card to use back in Spain. Has anyone had any luck using the cards for geo-tagging in Europe?

The Pro costs $150 and is available now.

Product page [Eye-Fi. Thanks, Gina!]

Western Digital’s huge new 4TB external drive is aimed at Mac Users, but is just as good for anyone else. And with yesterday’s launch of new MacBooks bringing back a FireWire port to  the small Mac notebook, the drive looks like a rather good companion.

The white MyBook Studio Edition II has four ways to hook up: eSata and FireWire 800 are the speediest, followed by FireWire 400 and the lowly USB 2.0. Western Digital also says that the drive is Time-Machine compatible, a slightly misleading claim as any external drive will work with Apple’s crappy backup software. What is useful, though, for Mac and PC owners alike, is that the lid of the box flips up to allow fast access to the hard drives inside (two of them are already in there, holding 2GB apiece). This is how all external drives should be made, allowing fast upgrading or replacement when the drives crash.

The price, though, is a little steep. For the 4TB version you’ll need to find $650.

Product page [WD via Digital Trends]

It’s no secret that we’re smitten with Drobo’s storage “robots.” But they’re expensive, especially compared to direct-attached or NAS storage devices built on a traditional RAID architecture. But if price is holding you back then you’ll be happy to hear that for a limited time, you can take 20% off the list price of the 4-bay array. If you’re lucky, you already have a handful of loose drives to plug-in else why not stuff it to capacity for 8TB of disk this Father’s Day? Granted, still no built-in Ethernet without the optional DroboShare, but at least you’ve got an extra paper hundie to dry your tears.

Filed under: Storage

Drobo 4-bay storage robot now $100 less for dad, mankind originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 09 Jun 2009 05:58:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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While just about any SSD will make your average computing experience a fair bit more awesome, it takes a really unique device to make said experience Animal-Style-Triple-From-In-N-Out special. Up until now, the general consensus was that Intel’s X-25M was the crème de la crème, but it seems that Corsair’s recently launched P256 may just be giving that very drive a real run for its money. After seeing a pre-production unit deliver some respectable early results, we figured it prudent to pass along PC Perspective‘s full-on review. In most cases, the 256GB P256 either topped or fell just behind Intel’s 80GB unit, though the drive did seem to suffer a bit in the random read / write tests. Still, critics felt comfortable recommending the drive, and while pricey, noted that it offered better value per gigabyte in comparison to similar 256GB units on the market.

Filed under: Storage

Corsair’s blistering P256 SSD reviewed: look out, X25-M originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 06 Jun 2009 08:08:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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