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Optical Storage

06 October 2008

Lite-On Europe sent out a press release this morning, announcing its new Blu-ray combo drive. The iHES206 reads single layer Blu-ray discs at 6x and is capable of 16x DVD±R, 8x DVD±R DL, 8x DVD+RW, 6x DVD-RW and 12x DVD-RAM writing speeds. The drive is scheduled to ship in November for an estimated retail price of 139 euro.

Lite-On proudly introduces its 6X internal Blu-ray Disc Combo, iHES206. The new Blu-ray Disc Reader plus DVD Writer provides consumers an all-in-one solution to playback high definition content, while maintaining the capability of archiving data onto CD or DVD.

The Lite-On iHES206 with Serial ATA interface is a great solution for enthusiasts who wish to enjoy the advanced technologies of Blu-ray in home entertainment. It will not only allow them to play high-definition content such as Blu-ray movies, it will also provide users all the advantages of a DVD Writer.

The iHES206 is capable of recording on today’s most popular DVD and CD media in the market, and playback from media such as Blu-ray Discs, DVD, and CD. The drive can read BD-R/RE/ROM discs at 6X (Double Layer at 4X). It can write DVD±R at 16X, DVD±R DL and DVD+RW at 8X, DVD-RW at 6X and DVD-RAM at 12X.

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03 October 2008

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Flash Memory

03 October 2008

Fusion-io, a leading provider of solid state technology and high-performance I/O solutions, unveiled its first consumer product, the ioXtreme, at the E for All conference and expo. The ioXtreme brings high-end PC users 80 GB of PCI-Expressbased, high-performance, solid state storage that was designed for the world’s fastest supercomputers.

“Imagine working on complex 3-D graphics, unzipping and manipulating massive files even installing a new application—all at the same time,” said David Flynn, CTO of Fusion-io. “Suddenly, with the ioXtreme, tasks that would have brought your system to its knees are no longer limited by the disks spinning loudly inside your box.”

Mechanical disk drive technology, inspired by Edison’s phonograph and originally invented over forty years ago, hasn’t kept up with the performance of today’s PCs. Multi-core CPU’s that perform tens of billions of instructions per second sit needlessly idle waiting for disks to access files. The seemingly endless delays starting applications, manipulating large files or doing just about anything that involves moving data to or from disk can now be a thing of the past. The new memory tier offered with the ioXtreme closes this performance gap, allowing PC users to utilize disk drives for what they do best—providing inexpensive, high-capacity archival storage.

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Optical Storage

03 October 2008

Sanyo announced today that it has developed a blue-violet semiconductor laser capable of outputting 450mW. According to the company's press release, the laser is capable of recording four layer Blu-ray Discs at speeds up to 12x. Sanyo also claims that a device equipped with the laser would be able to dub an entire two hour program in as little as ten minutes. Sadly, Sanyo's doesn't plan to put its new laser into mass production for another 2-3 years.

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02 October 2008

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Hard Disks

02 October 2008

Plextor Europe sent out a press release today, announcing a 500GB version of its pocket-sized PC-to-TV media player. Using the MediaX PX-MPM500U, consumers can take the photos, music and video stored on their PC and play them back on their TV at resolutions up to 720p.

An ideal Christmas gift, Plextor has grown the capacity of its hugely popular HD PC-to-TV mediaplayer to 500GB, but keeps its pocket-sized case for ultra portability. The Plextor MediaX PX-MPM500U, is capable of playing HD movies and music through your TV or hi-fi simply and easily.   Rudy De Meirsman, Sales & Marketing Manager at Plextor, says: “We have only recently introduced our first pocket-sized MediaX and it has proved very popular with buyers across Europe – at 160 or 320GB. Now with 500GB it is even more appealing, especially in run-up to Christmas when it will make a fantastic present. They are ideal for transferring pictures or HD movies to your family TV.”  

With Christmas fast approaching, the combined mediaplayer/ external HDD device makes an ideal gift for loved ones – perfect for taking your holiday photos and movie footage with you wherever you go.

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Hard Disks

02 October 2008

According to Bloomberg, Fujitsu is rumored to be selling its money-losing hard drive business to Western Digital. While neither company has confirmed this rumor, the business is expected to sell for 70-100 billion yen and will include Fujitsu's plants in Japan, the Philippines and Thailand.

Fujitsu Ltd. is in talks to sell its unprofitable storage-drive business to Western Digital Corp., three Fujitsu executives said, asking not to be identified because the discussions are preliminary.

The executives declined to comment on the sale price after the Nikkei newspaper said today the business may fetch 70 billion yen ($659 million) to 100 billion yen. Tokyo-based Fujitsu said in a statement that the report had ``no factual basis.''

Fujitsu rose as much as 7.2 percent in Tokyo trading as Deutsche Bank AG and JPMorgan Chase & Co. said a sale may help raise investor confidence over management's commitment to boost earnings. A purchase may help Western Digital challenge Seagate Technology's lead in a storage-drive industry that's facing falling prices and competition from flash memory chipmakers.  

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Hard Disks

02 October 2008

Western Digital announced this week that it has begun to ship the second-generation of its WD Caviar Green desktop hard drives. Available in capacities ranging from 500 GB to 1 TB, WD's new Green hard drives consume up to 20% less power and offer a 10% increase in performance over the previous version^.

WD (NYSE: WDC) today announced the second-generation of its highly popular and environmentally friendly WD® Caviar® Green™ desktop hard drives, which feature the company's GreenPower™ technology to significantly reduce power consumption, compared with standard hard drives. The new platform is based on WD's 333 GB/platter technology with 32 MB cache, producing capacities ranging from 500 GB to 1 TB¹.

As an innovative leader in green storage technology, WD has ramped up its successful GreenPower technology-based hard drives to greater than 10 percent of its 3.5-inch hard drive shipments in the initial twelve months of production, making low-power technologies one of WD's fastest growing segments and WD Caviar Green one of the most successful new products in the company's recent history.

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01 October 2008