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Optical Storage
Things aren't looking good for Prodisc. Earlier this week, the company asked a local court in Taiwan for protection against its creditors to prevent them from seizing its assets. According to the China Economic News, Prodisc has also filed for corporate restructuring and will be shutting down its optical disc business. Add a comment

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Hard Disks
Memorex recently announced its new line of portable hard drives. The Essential TravelDrive delivers up to 320GB of capacity and is available in four nature-inspired colors.

memorex essential traveldrive 400.png

Memorex, the leading brand of optical media at U.S. retail and a portfolio brand of Imation Corp (NYSE: IMN), today introduces the Essential TravelDrive(TM), the latest addition to its award-winning line of portable storage devices. The USB-based product features 2.5-inch hard drive technology, which delivers up to 320 GB of capacity, is available in several vibrant colors and easily fits into a pocketbook or purse.

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Other
Antec Twelve Hundred Gaming Case @ Virtual-Hideout
ASRock P45R2000-WiFi P45 DDR2/DDR3 Motherboard @ ThinkComputers.org
ASRock X48TurboTwins-WiFi Motherboard @ Phoronix
Asus Eee Box Desktop System @ HotHardware
Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3R Motherboard @ InsideHW
NorthQ Siberian Tiger Water Cooling System @ TweakPC
NZXT Sentry LX Aluminum Fan/Temp Controller @ BCCHardware
Pioneer BDC-S02 Blu-ray & 12x6 DVD±RW DL SATA Drive @ Rbmods
Sapphire Radeon HD4870 512MB Graphics Card @ Bigbruin.com
SilverStone SST-TS01B RFID External Drive Kit @ Benchmark Reviews
VOX V1 500GB USB and eSATA External HDD @ TweakTown Add a comment

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Home Entertainment
NEC Electronics announced today that it has developed the world's first single-chip LSI for Blu-ray Disc players. Combining the frontend functions of the SCOMBO/UM2P with the backend functions of the EMMA3P, the EMMA3PF has an analog circuit to process signals from the optical pickup, a decoding circuit for encoded video and audio and an HDMI to output video and audio. On top of that, the chip supports BD-ROM Profile 2.0, the latest Blu-ray Disc specification.

nec emma3pf.png

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Software
CyberLink sent out a press release earlier today, announcing the release of CyberLink BD Advisor 2. This new version of BD Advisor checks to see if a system is capable of playing advanced Blu-ray Disc content such as BD-Live features and Picture-in-Picture.

CyberLink Corp. (5203.TW), innovative solution provider for the connected digital lifestyle, today announced its release of CyberLink BD Advisor 2, the self-diagnostic tool that helps users identify if their system is able to play advanced Blu-ray Disc content such as interactive BD-Live features and Picture-in-Picture (PiP) movie commentary.

“CyberLink is committed to developing digital media applications for the Blu-ray format and continues to provide the most updated solution to our customers,” said Alice H. Chang, CEO of CyberLink. “The BD Advisor is a free tool helping our users to check if their PCs are Blu-ray ready. It has won many appreciations since its first release.”

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Hard Disks
Hitachi has announced that it has demonstrated the technical feasibility of magnetic recording at 610 Gbit/in2. While heads and media with an ultra-narrow track pitch of 65nm are still in development, these results indicate that current hard drive capacities can be increased by 2.5x.

Hitachi, Ltd. (NYSE:HIT / TSE: 6501) and Hitachi Global Storage Technologies (Hitachi GST), announced today that they have demonstrated the technical feasibility of magnetic recording at 610 Gbit/in2. This considerably exceeds the previously demonstrated capabilities of current perpendicular recording technology found in mass-production hard disk drive (HDD) products. These results hold the potential for a 2.5x increase in the storage capacities of current-generation HDDs.

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Software
Nero announced today that it has partnered with Polar Frog Digital to bring on-demand video DVD creation and distribution to retailers and consumers. The joint Nero/Polar Frog Digital solution utilizes Nero's liquid media technology, which enables content creation anytime, anywhere and on any device.

Nero, creators of liquid media technology, and Polar Frog Digital, a provider of innovative on-demand video services for DVD and downloadable solutions, today announced an exclusive U.S. agreement to bring on-demand video DVD creation and distribution to retailers and consumers. Together, Nero and Polar Frog Digital are extending digital entertainment content beyond its traditional confines, enabling on-demand DVD production for online and traditional retailers and making the much-touted commercial DVD kiosk delivery model a reality.

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Home Entertainment
A new survey conducted by ABI Research has found that consumers are delaying their Blu-ray player purchases. Of the 1000 people surveyed, more than half responded that they have no plans to purchase one. ABI Research also found that 23% were likely to buy a player, but not until sometime in 2009.

Blu-ray players are not flying off retailers’ shelves, at least not in the numbers the industry might hope for. A new consumer survey from ABI Research has revealed a widespread reluctance to commit to a Blu-ray player in the near future: over half of the 1000 respondents, citing “other priorities,” say they have no plans to purchase one; a further 23% are likely to buy, but not until sometime in 2009.

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Other
The IEEE announced this week that it has approved the 1394-2008 standard. The new standard includes the complete specifications for S1600 and S3200, which provides speeds of up to 3.2 Gigabit/second. Add a comment

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Optical Storage
DigiTimes is reporting that CMC Magnetics will be raising the OEM price of blank CD-R and DVD+R/-R discs by 10% in August. The company also plans to raise the price again in the fourth quarter of 2008 in an attempt to improve the profitability of optical disc production.

CMC Magnetics, who plans to adjust its OEM quotes for blank CD-R and DVD+R/-R discs up by 10% on average in August according to a previous report, plans to further hike OEM prices in the fourth quarter of 2008 in an attempt to significantly improve the profitability of optical disc production, according to company chairman Robert Wong.

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