- September 2, 2009 5:58 am
That 500GB 2.5″ drive just not cuttin’ it for ya? No worries. Toshiba has your back. Where many manufacturers have stopped, Toshiba has pressed on, to bring you, the customer, the most storage space for your buck and square inches. The story? Toshiba’s line of 2.5″ hard drives just received a pleasent storage bump. Surpassing the current industry limit of 500GB, Toshiba is venturing closer to a herald 1 TB 2.5″ hard drive with the alphabet soup 640GB MK6465GSX hard drive. Whipping your precious 1′s and 0′s around at an average 5400 RPM’s means a drive of this size and speed won’t blow your mind away with any super crazy fast read/write times. But what it will do is allow you to cram an ever larger amount of data into your space limited bag, pocket, or workspace. As an added bonus, said drives can be opted for purchase in 4 exciting cases colored: (Vivid White, Liquid Blue, Komodo Green and Rocket Red). Princing for these miniature giants is unknown if you want the external form in one of those four eye busting colors. However, if you just want the guts, $179 will be the cover charge.
Source: Engadget, Hot Hardware
Maybe the Personal Safe Flash drive doesn’t hold enough data for your liking. Do you need gigs upon gigs of secure storage? Where the Personal Safe flash drive falls short, the Padlock Encrypted Hard Drive excels. What truly makes this drive a secure powerhouse is that it is secured at the hardware level meaning that if a half-way intelligent thief rip the drive out of the case, your data will still be secured by either 128 or 256 bit encryption. Adding a further monkey wrench into any prying eyes can be easily accomplished by activating an admin password that can be set to override the original code!
Of course, what good is a portable hard drive if you have to carry a dozen different cables. Thankfully this miniature Fort Knox in a case is bus powered meaning all the juice and data transferring you can handle are taken care of by a solitary cable. Said cable retracts into the case for the ultimate low profile design when toting this thing around. Rounding out the list of notable features is the addition of shock proof mounts meaning that this drive is up to experiencing real life and isn’t just meant to sit on the desk and look pretty. Windows and OS X are both supported so it doesn’t matter which side of the fence you’re on, your data is good to go. As far as pricing goes, there are a few choices. If you want to dip your toe into the whole encrypted data scene, the 128 bit, 250 GB hard drive will set you back $100. Though if you’re extra paranoid and/or have a mountain of data, the 256 bit, 500GB hard drive runs $160 and may be more to your liking.
So what will it be, the Personal Safe Flash drive or the Padlock Encrypted Drive?
[Product Page]
Source: Wired, Macworld
Traditional spinning hard drives have been seeing increasingly larger storage capactities available in phsyical designs that are phsyically decreasing. Coupled with the growth/shrinkage is also the substantial reduction in price. I remember that as little as 1-2 years ago, a poratable hard drive in the 250GB range was upwards of $250. Now you can get the same capacity and phsyical size for much less, try around $100. Portable size is great, however one problem arises, the speeds at which most of these powertable drives operate – 5400 RPM’s. That is where OWC’s Mercury On-The-Go Pro picks up the ball and runs.
If 500GB (the current max for 2.5″ portable hard drives) is simply not enough to fulfill your digital appetite, LaCie has something they would like to woo you with. Cleaverly named the “LaCie Rugged XL External Hard Drive”, this slightly larger than normal portable drive which uses a 3.5″ desktop drive (instead of your average portable drive size of 2.5″) will enable you to take more 1′s and 0′s with you on the road while still being safe and secure inside of a case made for the toils and troubles that accompany movement in the outside world. If the added size (since it does use a 3.5″ desktop drive) is detering you, you can always wait for 2.5″ drives to reach the magical 1TB mark. It won’t be much longer…really. Protection for the XL drive comes by way of an aluminum chassis, a shock resistent rubber sleeve, and internal anti-shock bumpers. You 1′s and 0′s will also enjoy being wisked to and fro quickly thanks to USB 2.0 and eSATA support. Being larger than your typical external means the price will be slightly higher, $159.99. Just take pride in knowing that you will be one of the few who are *safely* carrying around 1TB worth of junk. If you are super excited you will soon find your new hotness at LaCie’s online store.
Source: Geeky-Gadgets, Tech Fresh, [Product Page]*Image source* Crunch Gear
If you need a really portable hard drive and high capacity flash drives just aren’t big enough (or too expensive), Apricorn may have something right up your alley. Traditional portable hard drives such as a Western Digital Passport are based off of 2.5″ laptop hard drives. This latest miniature wonder from Apricorn uses an even smaller 1.8″ hard drive that manages to cram 240GB of space for all of your 1′s and 0′s. Because the drive uses a smaller technology, it is a little more pricy than it’s bigger cousins with the 240GB drive weighing in at $269. Other sizes available include 80GB and 120GB. For those of you who just need to know the actual size of the drive: 17mm x 68.5mm x 86mm. So if size and storage mean a lot to you, give Apricorn a try.
Source: Slippery Brick, Geeky-Gadgets
