- Details
- Hard Disks
Western Digital and Hitachi, Ltd. announced today that they have entered into a definitive agreement whereby WD will acquire Hitachi Global Storage Technologies (Hitachi GST), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Hitachi, Ltd., in a cash and stock transaction valued at approximately $4.3 billion. The proposed combination will result in a customer-focused storage company, with significant operating scale, strong global talent and the industry's broadest product lineup backed by a rich technology portfolio.
Under the terms of the agreement, WD will acquire Hitachi GST for $3.5 billion in cash and 25 million WD common shares valued at $750 million, based on a WD closing stock price of $30.01 as of March 4, 2011. Hitachi, Ltd. will own approximately ten percent of Western Digital shares outstanding after issuance of the shares and two representatives of Hitachi will be added to the WD board of directors at closing. The transaction has been approved by the board of directors of each company and is expected to close during the third calendar quarter of 2011, subject to customary closing conditions, including regulatory approvals. WD plans to fund the transaction with a combination of existing cash and total debt of approximately $2.5 billion.
- Details
- Flash Memory
Super Talent Technology, a leading manufacturer of Flash storage solutions and DRAM memory modules, today unveiled its next generation TeraDrive. Featuring the 2nd generation SandForce controllers, a SATA III 6Gbps interface, and the new ONFi Double Data Rate NAND flash, these new drives promise to deliver twice the performance of their predecessors.
At 3 Gbps, the SATA 2 interface posed a bottleneck to existing SSD designs but little performance was to be gained by changing to SATA3. That just changed. As double data rate (DDR) NAND becomes available, SSD performance stands to double overnight. Since the new 2nd generation SandForce controllers support both SATA3 and DDR flash, we are now able to unleash the performance of these new designs.
- Details
- Other
Imation Corp., a leading global technology company dedicated to helping people and organizations store, protect and connect their digital world, today announced that the company has acquired ENCRYPTX Corporation, a leader in encryption and security solutions for removable storage devices and removable storage media. Approximately 10 employees will transfer from ENCRYPTX to Imation; other terms of the transaction were not disclosed. The acquisition, which follows Imation’s recent unveiling of its strategic direction as a technology company focused on growth opportunities in data storage, protection and connectivity, includes a portfolio of software solutions and intellectual property that allow enterprises to protect, encrypt, control, and manage “data at rest.”
“We are excited to bring the talented ENCRYPTX team and their portfolio of software solutions into Imation,” said Mark Lucas, president and chief executive officer, Imation Corp. “As a global leader in data storage, Imation understands the importance of protecting sensitive data against loss, theft, or security breaches, and has successfully partnered with ENCRYPTX in the past to develop elements of our Defender Collection(TM) of highly secure storage media and software solutions.”
- Details
- Optical Storage
New entertainment products from ASUS to be shown at CeBIT 2011 include Blu-ray drives with advanced media format compatibility, 3D playback, smartphone remote control functionality and USB 3.0-based high speed write performance. Also on display at the show are all-new active noise cancelling headphones, designed to provide high quality portable personal audio.
The new ASUS O!Play BDS-700 Blu-ray player uses Qdeo video post-processing to deliver clear, vivid images in native high definition and upscaling of 480p DVD content. It supports Blu-ray 3D playback on compatible screens for immersive movie-watching experiences, delivering 7.1-channel surround sound mastered in Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD. An independent audio-only HDMI port on the BDS-700 guarantees improved high definition audio performance through a dedicated channel.
- Details
- Hard Disks
Plextor, a leading brand of high-performance storage and digital media solutions, introduces a new portable hard disk drive, equipped with a high-speed USB 3.0 connection.
The PX-PH500U3 is a strikingly compact 500GB portable hard disk. Formed of perfect aluminum it incorporates the latest SuperSpeed USB 3.0 interface for exceedingly fast connection and data transfer rates. It is the fast new professional standard in portable hard disks from world renowned storage manufacturer Plextor. Power to the hard disk is also provided through the USB connector, eliminating the need to carry an additional power adapter.
Protecting the advanced drive mechanism an elegant casing crafted from aircraft grade aluminum results in a mere 162 grams total weight. The complete package includes a USB 3.0 cable and a stylish leatherette case provides additional protection during transportation. Complementing this well-balanced hardware, a range of powerful software applications comes preinstalled on the hard disk. Users can backup and restore valuable data using FNet PC Clone EX and maximize the read and write speeds with the Turbo HDD utility.
- Details
- Other
The USB Implementers Forum (USB-IF) today announced that 200 products have passed SuperSpeed USB certification testing. The latest certified devices include the first certified SuperSpeed USB flash drive from Imation and also the first certified SuperSpeed USB media player, the O!Play HD2 from ASUS.
hese new products signal the vitality of SuperSpeed USB and expand the list of certified products to include motherboards, notebooks, external storage devices, flash drives, media players, PCI Express and ExpressCard add-in cards, storage controllers, hard disk drives and device-enabling silicon.
“The industry ramp of SuperSpeed USB products achieving certification has been phenomenal,” said Jeff Ravencraft, President & COO, USB-IF. “We have seen the number of certified products quadruple since CeBIT 2010 and the certification workshops and labs continue to fill up with products from around the globe. This is a testament to the consumer and manufacturer enthusiasm behind the technology.”
- Details
- Network Storage
Today Synology America Corp. is pleased to announce the official release of its latest operating system for the popular DiskStation and RackStation series of NAS products. DiskStation Manager (DSM) 3.1 has Synology continuing to bring yet more enterprise-level features within reach for the SMB and SOHO markets.
"This latest release simply underscores Synology's commitment to bring ever more powerful tools to its business users," said Jason Bonoan, Product Marketing Manager at Synology America. "The real value of this upgrade is that it actually increases the capabilities of existing systems, giving business users more reliable and flexible servers than they had originally purchased, at no additional cost."
Synology Hybrid RAID (SHR) in DSM 3.1 gives business users the option to choose 2-disk redundancy, allowing the volume to survive the failure of 2 disks. The updated storage manager offers support for iSNS to allow for centralized management of iSCSI resources. This gives users a choice in reliability.
- Details
- Flash Memory
The NVM Express 1.0 specification that defines an optimized register interface, command set and feature set for PCI Express (PCIe)-based Solid-State Drives (SSDs) has been released today by the NVMHCI Work Group. The goal is to help enable the broad adoption of SSDs using the PCIe interface.
The significant advances in performance enabled by non-volatile memory-based storage technology, as embodied in PCI Express-based SSDs, has demanded the surrounding platform infrastructure evolve to keep pace and allow the system to realize the full potential of these devices. A primary goal of NVM Express is to provide a scalable interface that unlocks the potential of PCIe-based SSDs now and into the future. The interface efficiently supports multi-core architectures, ensuring thread(s) may run on each core with their own queue and interrupt without any locks required. For Enterprise-class solutions, there is support for end-to-end data protection, security and encryption capabilities, as well as robust error reporting and management capabilities.
The NVM Express specification offers numerous benefits as a standard interface through the interoperability it fosters. For example, each OS vendor may confidently write a driver that works for devices from multiple vendors. OEMs may procure devices from diverse suppliers that all implement a consistent feature set. Time to market may be reduced as validation times shrink with standard drivers and OEMs leverage the same test suites across devices.
- Details
- Optical Storage
According to Futuresource research, worldwide pre-recorded Blu-ray video disc production exceeded 400m units in 2010, an increase of nearly 60% compared with 2009. Factoring in PS3 titles, overall BD production volumes were significantly higher, and the longer-term outlook shows production volumes will continue to expand, with annual global output on track to reach two billion discs by 2014.
“The BD replication industry saw capacity utilisation improve markedly during 2010, with replicators working flat-out during the final months of the year to get product on the shelves in time,” says Jim Bottoms, Director and Co-founder, Futuresource Consulting. “With the growing demand for titles on the high definition format, Q4 2011 BD capacity utilisation will average more than 80% in North America and more than 75% in Europe. Taking into consideration production spikes during that period, the figure is dangerously close to the industry’s operating limit, and given the high level of market expansion expected over the next few years – driven by growing player ownership and falling title retail prices – substantial additional investment is required this year to prevent peak quarter capacity shortages.”
These shortages could result in order backlogs and compromised street dates. The problem will be further compounded by the increasing use of combo packs, featuring more than one BD, as well as collectors’ box set promotions involving some of the leading film franchises of recent years, which will put pressure on both replication capacity and hand pack capabilities.
- Details
- Flash Memory
Patriot Memory, a global pioneer in high-performance memory, NAND flash, storage and enthusiast computer products, today unleashes the Supersonic Magnum -- a 128GB USB 3.0 SuperSpeed flash drive that combines lightning-fast performance with massive storage capacities.
The Patriot Supersonic Magnum combines a single-chip native USB 3.0 controller with eight-channels of memory to deliver sequential read and write speeds up to 200MB/s and 110MB/s respectively – beyond the performance capabilities of internal hard drives.
“We continually try to raise the performance bar when it comes to our flash drives. With our new eight-channel memory controller, we are able to reach read and write performance levels previously impossible with external storage,” says Les Henry, Patriot Memory’s Vice President of Engineering.
