It looks like Buffalo hasn’t met a memory card it didn’t like, finding room for just about every format under the sun in it’s new MCR-C12H/U2 series card reader, although they sure know how to stretch the definition of individual card types. Still, marketing hype aside, the so-called “28-in-1″ reader packs support for most everything you could ask for, including seemingly every variation of SD, mini/microSD, xD, CompactFlash, and Memory Stick — and, with the aid of a fresh firmware update, SDHC cards up to 4GB as well (making it a 29-in-1 reader if you follow Buffalo’s logic). Our friends in Japan should be able to pick the reader up now, in their choice of four pretty tame colors, for 2,960 Yen (about 25 bucks).

[Via Akihabara News]
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from engadget

 

Today’s speed record for fastest CompactFlash writes set by: SanDisk. Their new SanDisk Extreme IV CF cards come in sizes up to 8GB, and offer speeds of at least 40MBps, not to mention the extreme environmental conditions they can suffer through (-13°F to 185°F). The cards are surprisingly affordable, however, weighing in at $160 for the 2GB, $320 for the 4GB, and $640 for the 8GB. Perhaps it’s overkill for your puny mid-range DSLR, but from the looks of it you’d probably hang on to this memory card a lot longer than your average digital camera.

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from engadget

 

According to DailyTech, “HP has developed a chip smaller than a single grain of rice that’s able to store 512KB and transmit and receive information using Wi-Fi standards at 10Mbit/sec”. No word yet on when this technology will go into production.

Measuring 2-4mm square, HP said that its new chip is far superior to current Bluetooth or RFID standards. Although the new chip is roughly two years away from being complete, HP said that the storage capacity of the chip is likely to grow

[via DailyTech]
from techeblog

With Toshiba and Panasonic having already unveiled their respective 4GB SDHC cards, you didn’t really think that industry powerhouse SanDisk would be too far behind, did you? For the uninitiated, SDHC (or SD 2.0, as it’s also known) is a new FAT32-compliant format designed for capacities up to 32GB, with cards that look exactly like regular SD models, but that won’t work in any but the newest of digital devices. SanDisk’s offering — available sometime before the end of the month — is rated as a Class 2 card, meaning that it guarantees a minimum transfer rate of 2MB per second. The $200 pricetag also gets you a “free” MicroMate card reader, which is not only handy but vital to making the most out of your new card, as the SD readers you currently own won’t have any idea what to do with this thing.

From engadget
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Taiwanese company PQI (Power Quotient International) augmented its SATA flash drive line with a 64GB model. The storage units, billed as the world slimmest flash drives, consist of 3mm-thin cards that hold huge amounts of data and plug into a Mac or PC using USB 2.0.

The company says these discs will have a transfer rate of 25MB per second, and will be highly efficient, consuming just a small amount of power. A frustrating part of this announcement is that the most important element of this equation, the cost of these drives, was not released yet. – Charlie White

PQI 64GB 2.5-inch SATA flash disk now available [Newlaunches]
from gizmodo

 

Cornet joins the one terabyte club with the Maximus Platinum drive. Sporting USB 2.0 and both Firewire 400 and 800, this drive should be great for owners of the MacBook Pro 17″, which still has the Firewire 800 port. Windows XP and 2000 are also supported.Available now for $1,230. – Jason Chen

Product Page [Cornet via Extreme Tech]
from gizmodo

Western Digital is now shipping its My Book Pro Edition ($350), a 500GB external hard disk that works with Macs and PCs and has a triple play of interfaces including FireWire 800, FireWire 400 and USB 2.0. Besides adding that lickety-split FireWire 800 connectivity, it’s a 7200 RPM drive, just like its 500GB brandmates released three months ago, the My Book Essential Edition ($300, USB 2.0), and the My Book Premium ($330, FireWire 400 and USB 2.0).

One distinguishing feature of all three of these drives is their capacity gauge, that backlit blue bullseye LED on the front that shows at a glance how much space you have left on the drive. Hey, that’s a great idea. And then there’s that nostalgic look of the drive itself designed by IDEO, and yes, that’s actually what books looked like, back in olden times. – Charlie White

Update: Reader Brad tells us that not all Western Digital MyBook drives have the external gauge for percentage filled. The MyBook Essential (green box) does NOT have it. The others do. Thanks, Brad!

Product page [Western Digital]
from gizmodo