By Evan Ackerman

We got our first peek at the Pogoplug at last year’s CES, and it promised to be an impressive little thing: plug a USB hard drive into one end, your network into the other, and all of a sudden you’ve got a locally mountable networked drive with web sharing. Potentially, this is super convenient, but if you’ve ever tried to set up all that stuff yourself, it seems like one of those things that’s going to be either a major headache, or impossible, to get working.

Cloud Engines sent me a Pogoplug (and some microwave popcorn) to play around with a while ago, and I’ve got my impressions for you, after the jump.

So why the microwave popcorn? Simple… Put the popcorn in the microwave, start setting up the Pogoplug, and see which you have first: network and web sharing of a USB hard drive, or a tasty snack. Winner? The Pogoplug, obviously. Besides its functionality, the setup process is the beauty of this thing. Here’s how it goes:

1. Start popcorn.
2. Plug your USB drive (or drives, it’ll handle four right out of the box) into the PogoPlug, plug your PogoPlug into a free port on your router, and then turn on the power.
3. Go to the Pogoplug website and open an account. Although your Pogoplug comes with a registration ID to help them locate it, the two setups I’ve done have auto-detected mine on my network without a hitch. No messing with firewalls or network settings, it just works.
4. You’re done, and your Pogoplug now shows up online.
5. Wait.
6. Enjoy popcorn.

At this point, you have to remember not to panic if nothing shows up as attached. The Pogoplug has to (I’m guessing) index your drive before it can display it in the web interface, which (depending on the size of your drive) can take a few minutes.

If you want to access your drive from a local computer, you’ll need to download and install a little piece of software to manage that for you. Like all good little pieces of software, the Pogoplug program is simple and straightforward (although it does have to be running in the background all the time). Sign in, and the program will map your Pogoplug (and all drives attached to it) to the P: drive on your computer, which (as far as your computer is concerned) is just another local hard drive. This is super duper convenient, because it means that other bits of software can rely on data stored on drives attached to the Pogoplug just the same as they can rely on local drives. And unlike a conventional NAS (network attached storage) system, you can seamlessly do this from anywhere, as long as you have the software running plus an internet connection.

You can even give multiple computers using the same account access to a Pogoplug drive at the same time in this way. You can go so far as to open and edit the same file at the same time, although there is no notification that this is going on, and whatever is the most recent save will overwrite anything that anyone else has done. Still, if you’re trying to manage (say) a bunch of media on a network, it helps that one computer doesn’t get locked out if another computer is using the drive. A couple other nifty bits: if you’re on the same local network as your Pogoplug storage, it transfers data locally (as opposed to using your internet connection). Also, you can set up automatic folder syncing to keep stuff backed up through the Pogoplug.

Once you get past how easy it is to network USB drives to multiple computers via the internet, you can turn your attention to all of the sweet features included in the Pogoplug web interface.

Basically, the Pogoplug tries as hard as it can to make the web interface just like browsing the drive directly. It’s not really possible to do this without having access to all the programs that you normally use to open files, but you do have immediate access to most common types of media, and you can always download what you need directly from your drive.

Besides just giving you access to all of your stuff via the web, the Pogoplug also allows you to share anything on your drive with the rest of the internet if you want. It’s as simple as browsing to a folder through the web interface, and entering the email addresses of people who you’d like to share it with. They’ll get a web link in the email that allows them to access the files via a web interface just like you do, except you have the option to set view/download only permissions. There are a bunch of other options too, like email updates when you add stuff to shared folders, RSS feeds, completely public viewing, and integration with Facebook and Twitter and stuff. Incidentally, if you’ve got friends with Pogoplugs, anything they share with you becomes accessible via your local P: drive, how awesome is that?

Pogoplug has a free iPhone app that you can download that not only allows access to your drives through a file browser, but allows you to stream music and videos (!), view pictures, create shares, and even upload stuff directly from the phone to your drive. In theory, anyway. In practice, I’ve had mixed results with it, especially when it comes to media streaming, but also sometimes issues as simple as just not being able to properly connect to my drives. When it works (which is most of the time, to be fair), it’s just like having stuff directly on your phone: you get music playlists, cover art, and the ability to browse and search, plus access to pics and office documents and PDFs and stuff. The video is a bit trickier; it seems like there’s some kind of size limitation. I can’t stream movies or TV shows, but I can get clips to work just fine. In any case, they’ve been updating the app regularly, so I’m not too worried.

Part of the reason that I’m not too worried is that I had a minor issue with my first Pogoplug disconnecting after extended inactivity. The Pogoplug support site is quite comprehensive, and I was able to open a ticket online and somebody got back to me within hours. No matter how simple something is, stuff can always go wrong, so it’s comforting to know that there’s a good tech support system in place (plus a community forum) to fix any issues that might come up.

In general, I haven’t had that many hiccups with the Pogoplug. It really just works, and offers you a slew of options that you never had before with external hard drives, at least not without a major amount of work. The one quibble I have is that when I put my computer into standby, the local drive mapping software disconnects itself and then disappears, and I have to force quit it and restart it. But, it’s really not a big deal, because it doesn’t have any direct impact on the functionality, which is still there when I need it.

If you’re thinking about getting a conventional network attached storage system, don’t. Get a Pogoplug instead. A Pogoplug combines some of the most convenient aspects of local and cloud storage into one device that takes 30 seconds to set up and does pretty much everything you’d want it to do, and more. At $130, it’s certainly not cheap, but there’s no subscription fee for the web access service and you’re going to pay at least that much as a premium to add NAS capability to a conventional hard drive which still won’t give you as many options as the Pogoplug will. I really like this thing.

You can buy a Pogoplug directly, or find them at places like Amazon, TigerDirect, and Fry’s Electronics.

[ Pogoplug ]

By Chris Scott Barr

Man, my 1.5TB drives sitting in my storage server are starting to look smaller and smaller all the time. We’re finally starting to see 7200 RPM 2TB drives, and now TDK is talking about 2.5TB. Apparently the company is putting their new 640GB platters through the usual tests. Once those are finished, they will be able to stack four of them up in a single 3.5-inch drive. Mass production should begin in November, with drives appearing on the market early next year.

TDK is also working on 320GB platters that will allow for 640GB 2.5-inch drives. We should see these on the market late this year, or early 2010. Sure, Western Digital has 1TB drives, but these based on TDK’s technology will actually fit in your laptop.

[ TDK ] VIA [ Electronista ]

By Chris Scott Barr

Technology is always being improved upon, usually meaning faster speeds and more storage coming in smaller packages. One of the latest technological milestones comes to us from Western Digital. The hard drive manufacturer has announced that they have crafted the highest capacity 2.5-inch drives. Utilizing 333GB platter technology, they were able to birth 750GB and 1TB drives. There’s only one small problem. Specifically a 3mm problem.

When you hear about a 2.5-inch hard drive, you’ll probably think that its primary function is to sit inside a laptop. Well if you were to crack open most laptops, you’ll find a drive that measures 2.5-inches long, and 9.5mm thick. Unfortunately these new drives from Western Digital are 12.5mm thick. This means that there are going to be a lot of notebooks that don’t accept these new larger drives.

Since these aren’t going to work in a lot of laptops, Western Digital says that they will be perfect for portable storage solutions. Unfortunately, I’m not thinking that they’ll perform all that well in this area either. First, the drive only spins at a paltry 5200RPM, meaning it will be slow as molasses. The cache is also a measly 8MB. Frankly, $190 for the 750GB and $250 for the 1TB drive are too expensive for that speed. I can get a 3.5-inch 1TB drive that spins at 7200RPM with a 32MB cache for around $80. It’s a little bigger, sure, but if you’re actually storing files large enough to require that much space, you’ll really notice the difference in speed.

[ Western Digital ] VIA [ Crave ]

Back at the end of 2007 I introduced you guys to a company called Fusion-IO, which was producing hard drives that ran on your PCI-Express slots. It was a pretty cool idea then, but unfortunately their offering was really salty, and aimed primarily at enterprise customers. Well since one of the co-founders is a hardcore gamer, they decided to branch out and try to bring the same incredible performance to a new crowd.

Enter the ioXtreme. This card holds 80GB of storage (NAND Flash) which is capable of giving you a performance boost that you won’t see by just upgrading your CPU and RAM. Games, large applications like Photoshop and Final Cut will open almost instantaneously. They likened it to bringing up a program that was minimized on your start bar, which is pretty incredible. They even said that it would be possible to boot Windows in just one second. Unfortunately this feature won’t be available at launch, due to them still working out bugs with a few different BIOS, it will however be available via a driver update. The card should be launching later this year for somewhere around $800, though the price is subject to change.

By Chris Scott Barr

Having a fast hard drive is always important when you’re building your next gaming rig. It doesn’t matter how fast your CPU or graphics card is, if you’re sporting an old IDE drive it’s not going to be up to snuff. Usually when one considers the fastest drives, they tend to think of SSD drives running on SATA II. However, PCIe cards are starting to crop up these days.

Not long ago we showed you the PhotoFast G-Monster PCIe SSD drive, which boasted 700MB/s read and 750MB/s write times. When compared to other SATA II drives, this seemed like a nice improvement. However, PhotoFast has already outdone themselves in just a couple of short months. Their latest drive now hits 1000MB/s read/write speeds. That’s just crazy. Almost as crazy as the $1,600 starting price for a 128GB model.

[ G-Monster ] VIA [ SlipperyBrick ]

By Shane McGlaun

I once managed to fling my notebook computer across the room where it landed flat on its back with a thud. I just knew when I opened it up the LCD would be shattered and it would never work again. The only thing broken was the hard drive and after replacing it I was back surfing the net again.

Samsung has a new hard drive that is ruggedized to prevent just the sort of damage my notebook received. The hard drive is called the Spinpoint M7 and can withstand shock up to 400G/2ms while operating. The 2.5-inch drive is available in 250, 320, 400, and 500GB capacities.

Samsung says that the drives use a new controller that saves 25% on power in seek mode and is 18% faster than traditional 2.5-inch hard drives. The drives also feature Samsung SilentSeek and NoiseGuard technology to keep noise down. The drive spins at 5400 rpm and uses NCQ.

[ Samsung ]

By Chris Scott Barr

When it comes to laptops, there are only two things that you can really do to upgrade your hardware. That would be adding RAM and swapping out your hard drive. With the latest round of MacBook Pros, there have been some issues finding compatible RAM that isn’t direct from Apple (which is always on the expensive side). Luckily OCZ has your back on both RAM and a new hard drive for your Mac.

This week OCZ announced two new lines of RAM, and a new SSD specifically aimed at Mac users. First their “Qualified for Mac” RAM comes in DDR2 and DDR3 flavors. The DDR2 is 667MHZ PC2-5400 with a CL of 5-5-5-15. These can be found in single 2GB sticks either alone, or packaged in a pair. As for the DDR3 sticks, these are 8500 MHZ PC3-1066 with a CL of 7-7-7-20. They can also be found in single 2GB sticks, or in pairs.

OCZ also announced their new Vertex Seris Mac Edition SATA II 2.5-inch SSD. The drives boast sequential read/write speeds of 240MB/s and 170MB/s respectively, and 64MB of onboard cache. Not only will these boost the speed of your activities, but increase your battery life as well. The new Vertex SDD’s will come in 30, 60, 120 and 250GB capacities. No word on pricing or availability of these newly announced products.

[ OCZ Product Page ]

By Shane McGlaun

I like computers and for me and many other enthusiasts what we really want is a hard drive that has lots of storage space, fast data access times, and quiet operation. I don’t particularly care how much power the drive consumes so long as it meets my other wants.

In the enterprise computing environment, all of those things are important but at the top of the list is low power consumption. Shaving what seems like a tiny amount of power consumption from the massive amount of hard drives inside the typical data center can mean tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars in power savings. Hitachi has unveiled a new enterprise 2.5-inch hard drive that is fast and sips power like a social drinker at a frat party.

The drive is a 2.5-inch form factor unit connecting to servers via the SAS interface and the drive spins at 10,000 RPM. The drive needs only 3.4 watts of power in idle mode and 6.1 watts in full seek mode. Hitachi also says that the 2.5-inch form factor needs 75% less physical space than the average 3.5-inch hard drive. The Ultrastar C10K300 is available in capacities ranging from 147GB to 300GB.

[ Hitachi ]

By Luke Anderson

My main computer is pretty fast, with a nice overclocked Core 2 Duo, speedy RAM  and a kick-ass video card. Unfortunately it does have one piece slowing it down. While my hard drive is SATA (none of that ancient IDE crap here), I’d love to switch it out for a faster SSD drive. My main issue is that the speed gain just doesn’t justify the price. But what if price was no object? Just what could you do with say, 24 top-of-the-line SSD drives? You can open the entire Microsoft Office suite in half a second. You’d have transfer speeds topping out at 2GB. You’d even be able to make the kick-ass video seen above.

VIA [ Dvice ]

By Luke Anderson

I have a fairly large music collection, enough that my 16GB can’t hold it all. For the sake of functionality, I was willing to cut out a few tracks here and there. Now if your collection is enough to fill even the largest iPods, you might consider this offering from Rapid Repair.

The company is offering a 240GB hard drive for 1st and 2nd generation iPod Videos. That’s double the size that even the current iPod classic can hold. I’m really not sure why you would need that much music and video with you at all times, but hey, if you’ve got $300 burning a hole in your pocket be my guest.

[ Rapid Repair ] VIA [ CrunchGear ]