Solid State Drive technology is set to turn the storage industry on its ear; there is little doubt of this.  When you consider the intrinsic benefits of anything built on solid state technology versus anything mechanical, it doesn’t take a degree in physics to understand the obvious advantages.

On the following pages, we thought we’d level-set the features, performance and pricing landscape for you with respect to the current state of SSDs.  Today, we have a look at four different SSD offerings, two from OCZ, one from Mtron and another from Super Talent.  Is a Solid State Disk in your future?  We’ll try to help you answer that question in this full performance evaluation and showcase.

Direct Link:

http://www.hothardware.com/Articles/FourWay-SSD-RoundUp-OCZ-Super-Talent-Mtron/

We have just taken a look at the 4GB ToughDrive Camo from ATP.  This is a rugged flash drive that is much smaller than other “rugged” drives and still manages to keep your data safe, secure, and protected from weather, the washing machine or fellow employees.  If you need to keep your data safe from the bumps, bangs and jarring of life, you’ll want to catch our review for all the details.

Title: ATP 4GB ToughDrive Camo
URL: http://www.bcchardware.com/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=6099&Itemid=40

Article Name: Thermaltake Vi-On Actively Cooled SATA/USB2.0 External Hard Drive Enclosure Review @ Tweaknews.net
Article Url: http://www.tweaknews.net/reviews/thermaltake_vi-on_hard_drive_enclosure/

Article Snippet:

“The Vi-On does exactly what an external enclosure should do – provide a cool and secure housing for that spare HDD you may have lying around. Installation takes only a few minutes and is simply a matter of snapping in the drive and then plugging it in to your PC. Both USB and a high speed eSATA interface are supported to make transferring files of all sizes a quick and easy process. For those times when portability is needed and the limited storage of a flash drive isn’t enough, the Vi-On paired with a SATA HDD is a handy alternative.”

Title:
A-DATA 16 GB 350x Turbo Compact Flash Card

Link:
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/AData/16GB_Turbo_350x_CF_Card

Brief:
The new “Turbo” Compact Flash card from A-DATA raises the bar from 266x to 350x performance. It also adds Ultra DMA capability and uses SLC flash memory to attain insane speeds never seen before. If you are looking to build a solid-state HDD using CF Technology then this is one of the cards you should definitely consider.

CPU3D Review: ATP ToughDrive Camo (8Gb) USB Flash Drive

Large capacity USB flash drive are now widely available … however, for may users size isn’t everything. Nowadays, consumers are now demanding a lot more … including durability, shock resistant, water-proof and rugged construction. ATP’s Special Edition ToughDrive Camo features  all of the above as well as Desert Camouflage Print and a large 8Gb of storage.

“ATP have produced a very good USB flash drive that features excellent build quality and rugged construction. It’s Windows Ready-Boost ready, water-proof, shock resistant and offers very good read/write performance. “

Read the rest of the review … http://www.cpu3d.com/content/view/5774/51/

Traditional hard disk storage is living on borrowed time. We know it and storage manufacturers know it. Solid state drives, which use non-volatile memory chips instead of rotating metal discs for storing data, are simply a better medium in the long run. They consume less power, create nearly zero heat, and produce no noise – but best of all, there are no moving parts to wear out over time. The technology and prices aren’t quite there yet, but it’s only a matter of time. Take a quick look through any tech-oriented forum and you will likely run into folks proclaiming the death of traditional platter based storage. For the most part, they’re right - but there is a twist to the story as platter based storage manufacturers are fighting back.

There is still plenty of life in traditional storage technologies, and Seagate is out to prove that with their newly launched Cheetah X15K.6 hard drives which feature 170 MB/s+ read / write speeds.  Head on over to the site and check them out…

Seagate Cheetah X15K.6 Hard Drive:

http://www.hothardware.com/Articles/Seagate-Cheetah-X156-Hard-Drive

Hard drive docks have become very popular lately taking on many shapes and forms, they really are useful especially if you’re in a hurry. With a dock you can just plug the hard drive into it and you don’t have to worry about putting it into an enclosure, docks are also great for tech people for the same reason really, they’re easy and allow fast access to the hard drives.

Today for review I’ve got a very interesting hard drive dock, this one support only 2.5” HDDs, it can use either SATA or IDE, there’s one port on each side for either style, and it also has a space on the top to be able to read and transfer data to or from a CF or MD card. It’s called the 2.5″ SATA/IDE HDD and CF to USB 2.0 Bridge Adapter and it’s from USBGeek. It’s a well made device that is inexpensive, coming in at only $22, for that price it’s well worth the money in just the time it can save you.

Read Full review HERE

USB hubs are great to add more ports to your computer, but most of them come with long cables and those that don’t are usually bulky and cumbersome making them hard to plug into tight spaces, especially on laptops.

Today for review I’ve got the USB 2.0 4-port Hub with Fold-away Plug and extra Power input from our friends over at USBFever, and it’s actually a fairly cool little product. It features a USB plug that rotates 315 degrees and also revolves 90 degrees as well making it so that it will fit in the tightest of situations. It even includes an extra USB power cord in case you need to have more power for the devices you plug into the hub that might need it. So continue on for a quick look at a simple little gadget that actually works well…

Read Full review HERE

We all like to take pictures but what if you take lots of them? You either have to carry around your laptop to transfer them to, or several memory cards which can easily get lost, not really a couple great choices there…

Today for review our friends at USBGeek have sent me over the Digimate III Touch Screen – SATA Edition hard drive enclosure. This enclosure is very special in that is features an OLED display and, as the name suggests, a touch screen. The Digitmate III also have several memory card slots located on the top and sides, the idea of the device is to eliminate the need to carry your laptop or many memory cards, with this device you can just pop in a memory card and transfer everything to the enclosed hard drive. It’s not only good for pictures but for anything that is on a memory card  like data, videos etc, you are only limited to the size of the hard drive inside as to what you can store on the Digimate III.
Read Full Review HERE

NEW CONTENT (Storage) - Western Digital VelociRaptor 10,000RPM Hard Disk in RAID 0

QUOTE: “When Western Digital launched their first 10,000 RPM consumer desktop drive, enthusiasts quickly took note. Now in its fourth generation, the Western Digital Raptor Series is still unchallenged and dominates the enthusiast and performance user markets.

10,000 and even 15,000 RPM hard drives started long before the Raptor Series but have been exclusively built for workstation and server environments utilizing SCSI and its successor, SAS connectivity. SATA and later SATA II bridged the gap between consumer ATA and SCSI standards and arguably the biggest performance gains came from Native Command Queuing, but the Raptor Series did not utilize this technology, not until now.”

For more information, please visit - http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/1573/western_digital_velociraptor_10_000rpm_hard_disk_in_raid_0/index.html

Best Regards,

The TweakTown Team
http://www.tweaktown.com

If you’ve got a Tilt, or most any other cellphone today really, then you’ve got a microSD card in it, and to transfer data to and from it you can easily just hook your phone up to your computer via USB, but as we’ve all found out that’s not the quickest way to do things…

The solution of course for fast file transfers is to use a card reader, but I’ve noticed that it seems actual microSD card readers are in short supply, you’d think that with the popularity of them we’d see many more on the market but we don’t. Most microSD cards come with an SD adapter and that’s about it, I know ATP at one time packaged a USB microSD card reader with their cards, (it’s really nice actually, I’ve got one) but I don’t know many other companies that do that, I guess they all assume that we have the ability to read SD cards so we won’t need the reader…

Read Full review HERE:

http://tiltmobility.com/2008/08/micro-sd-t-flash-card-reader-from-usbfever/

-

-

Title: Super Talent Pico-C Gold 8GB USB Flash Drive @ APH Networks

* Description: From the initial introduction of USB flash drives to present
day, this is one innovation that changed the way people carry data around.
Back in the days of floppy drives and floppy disks with a formatted capacity
of roughly 1.38MB, to the age of CD-RWs that was never able to take
precedence as the prominent portable storage medium, and ending up to present
day’s popularity of USB flash drives — how did it all come to be? Computer
enthusiasts first embraced this new type of products years ago as a symbol of
geekiness and a sort of unashamed pride. Bringing on 16MB, 32MB, and 64MB
drives, I still vaguely remember how ‘advanced’ I was with a stunningly large
512MB SanDisk Cruzer Micro. “It’s so compact and convenient,” as we used to
call it. Times have changed, and I still remember us praising the OCZ
Mini-Kart over two years ago on how unbelievably small it is. How two years
can mean so much in the technology world! This time, however, Super Talent
makes its attempt to redefine the market of unbelievably tiny USB flash
drives with the Pico-C — but while they’re at it, they are unwilling to lose
the capacity war with the drive available up to 8GB of storage, and claims to
be a winner in performance as well. Huge ambitions? We’ll see how they live
up to that.

* Link: http://aphnetworks.com/reviews/super_talent_pico_c_gold_8gb

microSD cards are extremely popular and have been gaining that popularity for a couple years now so I’m surprised that you don’t see more microSD card readers on the market today, usually a
microSD card comes bundled with an SD card adapter and that’s it. Now SD cards on the other hand often times come bundled with a USB card reader, but for the most part
microSD cards do not, the only company that I know that sometimes or did bundle a USB reader with their
microSD cards is ATP. Considering how popular they are you’d think you would see more of them out there but you just don’t for whatever reason…

For review today I’ve got a Micro SD / T-Flash
Card Reader from our friends at USBFever and it’s possibly the world’s smallest
card reader on the market today. A little while ago I reviewed the SuperTalent Pico-C Gold USB drive and this reader is actually a tiny bit smaller than the Pico-C Gold so it’s a very portable and very useful little gadget. Throw a
microSD card into it and you’ve got the making of the world’s smallest USB drive!

Read Full review HERE

A review of the QNAP TS-209 Pro II has just been posted at Barry’s Rigs ‘n Reviews:

Title:

QNAP TS-209 Pro II  @ BRnR

Link:

http://www.barrys-rigs-n-reviews.com/reviews/2008/hardware/ts209pro2/1.htm

Quote:

“While Network Attached Storage (NAS) devices for small businesses and home offices have come down in price, not everyone has the budget, or even the need for a RAID 5-ready NAS. If you’re seeking to leverage the dual-drive form factor of a conventional hard disk enclosure with the power and flexibility of a NAS, the QNAP TS-209 Pro II might just be what you’re looking for.”

NAS Boxes or Network Attached Storage boxes are becoming more and more popular not only for their uses but because they are getting more and more powerful and feature packed! When NAS boxes first came out they were your basic network storage solution but now they got their own CPUs, ram and operating systems built into them so that they are basically a server that can do on a small scale what mutli-thousand dollar servers do. With these new breeds of NAS boxes you can even host your own website, stream media, and of course access your data from anywhere in the world just by typing in a web address.

A little bit ago I took a look at the Thecus N3200 NAS box and it was a nice choice overall, but today for review I’ve got the TS-109 Pro II Turbo NAS from QNAP that personally I like much better than the Thecus. One of the main reasons is that it only uses one drive, the other reason is because of the features and abilities of the TS-109 Pro II, this box is small but packed to the brim with numerous features that anyone will love and use. This box even has a 500Mhz CPU with 256MB of DDR2 ram built in to make sure the system runs smoothly and does what you want when you want it to.

So continue on to learn more about a very nice product from QNAP…

Read Full Review HERE

QNAP TS-409 Pro Turbo NAS Honored Golden Bear Award from Bjorn3d
& Editor’s Choice from techPowerUp

Taipei, Taiwan, August 2008 - The leading storage solution provider QNAP Systems, Inc. today announced its All-in-One TS-409 Pro Turbo NAS has been honored the “Golden Bear Award” from Bjorn3d.com and “Editor’s Choice” from techPowerUp.com for its complete functions, good performance, ease of use, and outstanding RAID features for data protection.

The 4-bay, hot-swappable TS-409 Pro Turbo NAS is designed for business users who require high performance, mass storage, and useful server features. Powered by 500 MHz CPU and 256MB DRII memory, the NAS supports a wide range of enterprise-grade server features, e.g. RAID 0/ 1/ 5/ 6/ 5+spare disk redundancy, Online RAID Capacity Expansion, Online RAID Level Migration, HDD S.M.A.R.T. and complete log system. According to Bjorn3d, “After more than a month of use extensively testing the TS-409 we were left very favorably impressed, especially with the seemingly endless array of features and available configurations…(The TS-409 Pro) offered good performance, data protection, and differentiated themselves from their competition.”

The TS-409 Pro offers advanced RAID protection features which are rarely seen in other NASes of the same level. The unique Online RAID Capacity Expansion enables users to purchase the most cost-effective hard drives for initial server setup and upgrade to larger ones in the future. The Online RAID Level Migration allows users to start from one drive firstly and add more to upgrade the RAID level in the future with the data retained. As techPowerUp commented, “The added value comes from the extra disks and RAID levels supported. And when I say RAID I’m not talking about a simple onboard controller, the QNAP TS-409 Pro surprised me with RAID 6 (although slightly pointless with only 4 disks) and features like online expansion and migration. Such functionality is usually only found on advanced controllers you’d find in high end servers.”

The TS-409 Pro supports multiple file sharing protocols for users to share files across Linux, UNIX, Mac, and Windows platforms. Abundant valuable server functions including File Server, FTP Server, Web Server and Printer Server, etc., are supported. Also, encrypted remote replication and backup to external devices are available to enhance data protection. Various data storage and management mechanisms, e.g. FTP server with SSL/TLS encrypted technology, SSH login, and web page SSL login are offered for secure data transfer and sharing. Moreover, the TS-409 Pro adopts silent fan and power-saving design which is excellent for long-term operation and deployment in small business environment without server room. The hot-swap design is supported for replacing failed hard drive of a RAID configuration without turning off the server to ensure non-stop services and minimize maintenance cost and effort. Besides, the HDD S.M.A.R.T. provides complete information of the hard drive status to prevent potential physical drive failure. The comprehensive log system summarizes the detail data access records and connection status to server administrator. All error and warning messages can also be sent via e-mail alerts for ease of maintenance.

About Bjorn3d.com and techPowerUp.com
Bjorn3d and techPowerUp are the influential and professional online media devoted to providing interesting computer news, and best-in-hand reviews and previews to readers. For the complete review of Bjorn3d.com on QNAP TS-409 Pro, please visit http://www.bjorn3d.com/read.php?cID=1280&pageID=4870. To read the review of the TS-409 Pro from techPowerUp.com, please visit http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/QNAP/TS409.

For the specifications and features of QNAP TS-409 series, please visit http://www.qnap.com/pro_detail_feature.asp?p_id=85. You may also visit QNAP forum to join the discussion about using QNAP NAS. http://forum.qnap.com.

About QNAP
QNAP Systems, Inc. (QNAP) is a devoted and dominant provider of Internet Appliance products. With our solid and integrated expertise in the Linux embedded platform, QNAP has released more than 30 models for the network storage and digital network surveillance series over the past 5 years, providing our consumers with high performance and high reliability storage, backup, and surveillance solutions. Today, QNAP continues to lead the industry with our innovation in design and technology. Our products have gained worldwide recognition. For example, TS-409 Pro was honored “Golden Bear Award” from Bjorn3d (US), “Gold Award” from HWM (Singapore, Malaysia), “Dam Good” from Hardware Canucks (Canada), and “Golden Tachometer Award” from Benchmark Reviews (US) etc. TS-409U was awarded “Editor’s Choice” from Bios Level (US). TS-109 Pro was honored the “The Best NAS Box” from MAXIMUMPC (US), “Lord of NAS” from Hexus (UK), and “Golden Bear Award” from Bjorn3d (US) etc. TS-209 Pro was honored “Gold Medal Award” from ComputerGEIL.dk (Denmark), Golden Award from InfoMods (France), and “Product of the Year 2007″ from Hardware-TEST.dk (Denmark) etc.

Thecus Reveals the AMD Processor-Based N4100PRO
The Leader in Digital Storage Turbo-Charges the Four-Bay NAS

08/18/2008 – Beginning with the introduction of the N4100 NAS device, Thecus has rocked the world of digital storage with innovation after innovation. Today, Thecus is proud to reveal the brand new 4-bay NAS – N4100PRO. With powerful new RAID options, a built-in LCD, and vastly improved data throughput, the N4100PRO ups the ante once again with increased usability, functionality, and performance.

Powered by the AMD Geode™ LX800 processor and 256MB of DDR400 memory, the N4100PRO delivers the raw horsepower required to transfer files quickly and efficiently. With updated hardware and a ton of performance improvements, the data transfer speed of N4100PRO doubles that of the original N4100! Four 3.5″ SATA hard disk bays enable up to 4TB of storage, and users can manage this space with an updated list of RAID mode selections, including 0, 1, 5, 6, 10 and JBOD. The N4100PRO also offers advanced RAID management features, including RAID expansion and RAID level migration for ultimate flexibility. To top it off, the N4100PRO comes equipped with a big, bright LCM module, which displays useful status messages such as IP address, date and time, and RAID status, making it easy for users to keep an eye on the condition of their N4100PRO. With features like these, the N4100PRO is easier to manage than ever.

Read the rest of this entry »

Title: Vantec NexStar MX NST-400MX-SR at Modders-Inc

Summary: This External enclosure supports JBOD, Individual, Raid 0, and Raid 1 modes for effective storage management.  It also has the Ability to accept two drives with a total capacity of 2TB.

Articles URL: http://www.modders-inc.com/modules.php?name=NDReviews&op=Story&reid=222

Site URL:  http://www.modders-inc.com

NEW CONTENT (Storage) - Thermaltake BlacX eSATA & USB 2.0 Dock

QUOTE: “I have already taken a look at the BlacX USB and BlacX SE which is also a USB only desktop drive device. The Thermaltake BlacX units have started a new class in hard drive storage. You can’t really call them carriers since you don’t take them with you on the go, nor can you call them internal hot swap since they do not sit inside the case. I guess for now, until someone tells me differently we will call them desktop hot swap devices.

The first two USB only BlacX units we looked at performed brilliantly for USB. In the back of my mind, though, I knew the transfer performance was being held up by the connection and recommended to everyone to just hang tight and wait until the eSATA version became available. Today we have this version in hand; the BlacX (part number ST0005U) with eSATA support has finally made its way to my door step and even though I have other articles that need to be written up first, I just had to see how this baby performs.”

For more information, please visit - http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/1551/thermaltake_blacx_esata_usb_2_0_dock/index.html

Best Regards,

The TweakTown Team
http://www.tweaktown.com

OCZ Technology introduces the enhanced Core V2, the latest addition to the SSD series with New Features, Performance Gains, and Increased Storage Capacity

Sunnyvale, CA—August 14, 2008—Responding the demands of enthusiasts and high-performance mobile computing consumers, OCZ Technology Group, Inc., a worldwide leader in innovative, ultra-high performance and high reliability memory and computer components, today unveiled the newest addition to their industry-leading OCZ Core Series SATA II 2.5” Solid State Drives. The Core Series has established OCZ as a pioneer in the SSD market by offering consumers the benefits of solid drives technology at an affordable price. With the industry continuously shifting in this direction, OCZ strives to place its Core Series at the forefront.

“OCZ continues the trend of enabling consumers with the latest in cutting edge solid state disc technology with the introduction of the new Core V2 SSD,” said Ryan Petersen, CEO of the OCZ Technology Group. “As SSD technology progresses, OCZ will continue to release updated and enhanced solutions to ensure our customers stay on the leading edge. The new Core V2 drives offer consumers and system integrators increased capacities up to 250GB, improved read and write performance and faster seek time, all coupled with a new mini USB port empowering customers with the ability to further improve performance and compatibility by updating firmware in the future.”

Featuring new architecture, the Core Series SSD V2 will be available in up to a massive 250GB capacity and delivers enhanced speeds of up to 170 MB/s read and 98 MB/s write speeds with an improved seek time of less than 0.2-0.3ms, making the Core V2 significantly faster when it comes to both Read/Write and seek-time performance. The addition of a mini-USB port also makes it possible for customers in the field to update the Core V2’s firmware should new versions become available, to further enhance compatibility or performance with future platforms.

PR LINK

PRODUCT PAGE

Title: 320 GB Hard Disk Drive Round-Up
Link: http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/article/603
Category: Reviews

Summary:
We compared the performance of nine 320 GB SATA-300 hard disk drive models from Seagate, Samsung, Western Digital and Hitachi. Which is the fastest 320 GB in the market? Check it out!

Here is a snippet:
“When buying a hard disk drive most users are only concerned with the drive’s capacity. Should you also care about performance? We compared the performance of nine 320 GB SATA-300 hard disk drive models from Seagate, Samsung, Western Digital and Hitachi. Is there a big performance difference among them? Is it worthwhile to pay a little bit more and get a drive with a bigger buffer? If so, which is the fastest 320 GB in the market? Check it out!”

Super Talent Adds New Pico D to World’s Smallest USB Family

Chrome Swivel Hologram Lid Redefines Elegance

San Jose, California – August 13, 2008 – Super Talent Technology, a leading manufacturer of Flash storage solutions and DRAM memory modules, today announced the addition of a stylish new swivel model to its ultra-petite PICO USB drive series, dubbed Pico D.

Super Talent achieves maximum miniaturization in the Pico series, renowned as one of the world’s tiniest USB families, by using chip-on-board (COB) technology. While typical USB drives are 2.5-inches in length, the Pico D measures only 1.4-inches. Moreover, Pico drives are shock resistant, water resistant, and support up to 200X (30MB/sec) transfer speeds. The Pico D is available now from NewEgg and NewBiiz in capacities up to 8GB.

“Pico D is an exceptionally smart looking product. But after you carry it in your pocket and use it for a while you realize that there’s much more to it than handsome looks; very few other USB drives can measure up to the Pico D in features, performance and quality”, said Super Talent Director of Marketing, Joe James. “Our engineers and manufacturing people fussed over minute details for months before we took Pico D to production, so the finished drive has an unmatched feel of quality to it”, James added.

All Super Talent USB drives are backed with a lifetime warranty. The 8GB Pico-D drive, part number STU8GPDS, will be available this week from NewBiiz and NewEgg for under $40.

About Super Talent Technology

Super Talent Technology Corporation, based in San Jose, California, designs and manufactures a full range of DDR, DDR2, and DDR3 memory modules and Flash based storage devices for computers and consumer electronics. An ISO 9001 certified company, Super Talent utilizes its state-of-the-art factory and leading-edge components to produce award winning products with outstanding reliability. Super Talent is an active member of the JEDEC and ONFI standards bodies, and holds over 200 patents in Flash and DRAM technology.

Pricing is approximate as of date of announcement and is subject to change without notice. Usable capacity varies. Patents pending.

Specs Images

http://www.supertalent.com/products/stt_usb_detail.php?type=Pico

Since SATA drives have become the dominant style on the market today they’ve effectively kicked the IDE style drives to the side… Now, beat down, homeless and with no PC to call home these drives are trying to find a new life, a new purpose to keep spinning, they’re looking to prove that they can be useful once more. I’m glad to say that most of those old IDE drives can have a new purpose, be useful and get a nice new home in a brand new portable enclosure. With a nice hard drive enclosure you can bring new life to your old IDE drive, and give it a new purpose in life, it can be used as a backup to store your important data, or as a secondary drive for whatever your needs, and since these enclosures are meant to be portable you can then take your data with you to share with other. I guess we could call them mobile homes for IDE hard drives…

Up on the review block today is a product from EagleTech that is meant to give new life and new meaning to those old discarded IDE hard drives since you’ve upgraded to the new SATA versions; it’s the Consus N-Series IDE to USB Enclosure and it’s exactly as it sounds, an enclosure that turns your IDE hard drive into a portable USB hard drive. The Consus N-Series Enclosure is very nice, it’s well made, and it even has thumbscrews for easy access to install your IDE hard drive.

So continue on to check out a great new home for your old IDE hard drives…

Read Full Review HERE

Title: Super Talent 8GB Pico.C GOLD USB Flash Drive

Hi guys, we’ve just tested out this tiny techno-bling from Super Talent and discover that not all is golden with this device.

http://accelenation.com/?ac.id.275.1

Here’s a quote:

Every now and again two different innovations combine to produce a totally new product. This is exactly what occurred when the Universal Serial Bus interface combined with non-volatile flash memory, to produce a pen-sized plug-in storage device that required no batteries. Thus the USB flash drive was born.