Oh! Gizmo

By Andrew Liszewski

Today Sandisk announced a new line of compactflash cards aimed at professional photographers with read & write speeds of up to 90MB/s over a UDMA-6 bus. The Extreme Pro CompactFlash cards feature the company’s “Power Core Controller” for increased reliability over the life of the card, and include other pro features like a silicone coating for moisture and humidity protection. According to Sandisk the new cards are available/shipping worldwide now in 16, 32 and 64GB capacities ranging in price from $300 up to a hefty $800.

[ PR - SANDISK EXTREME PRO COMPACTFLASH MEMORY CARD RAISES BAR FOR PROFESSIONAL GRADE PERFORMANCE, CAPACITY AND RELIABILITY ] VIA [ SlashGear ]

By David Ponce

Backblaze is an online data storage solution. For $5 a month per computer, you get unlimited storage. But no one really cares about that, since there’s a lot of competition in this field. The reason we’re writing about them is that they’ve decided to show us how to build the basic unit of their storage solution: a custom-built, 45-drive, double-PSU, Linux-powered, 67-Terabyte, 4-U, rack mounted, storage pod. This particular storage unit can be built for a mere $7,867. We actually wish we were being sarcastic about that figure, but as it is, it’s really freaking cheap. The diagram below shows you how much a Petabyte of storage (or about 15 of these storage pods) would cost under several competing cloud storage services.

The reason they’re making this information available

is that by sharing, others can benefit and, ultimately, refine this concept and send improvements back to us. Evolving and lowering costs is critical to our continuing success at Backblaze.

Hit the link below to find out all the details on how to build your very own $7,800, 67-Terabyte storage solution.

[ Backblaze Article ] VIA [ BoingBoing ]

By Andrew Liszewski

If you thought you had problems storing all the RAW files from your digital SLR camera, imagine having to deal with the stream of data coming from a digital motion picture camera capturing footage at 24 frames per second or higher. That’s why researchers from the Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits IIS in Erlangen, Germany have developed the FlashBox which docks to a digital film camera, like the ARRI D21 or the Sony F35, and stores up to 500GB of footage on a couple of swappable SSDs.

At just 5.1 x 3.1 x 2.8 inches in size and 3.3 pounds the FlashBox is remarkably light and compact, but it can capture and store Bayer raw sensor data in resolutions up to 2048×1000 pixels, or compressed using the JPEG2000 codec. A built-in LCD also allows the footage to be played back as soon as it’s captured, and a “multi-level prompting process” ensures recorded scenes don’t get accidentally overwritten which is one of the few times when nagging software is a definite plus.

The FlashBox will be available to select beta testers sometime in the Spring of 2010, but a prototype will be exhibited at the IBC (International Broadcast Convention) show in Amsterdam starting on September 11.

[ Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft - The little giant of storage for the big screen ]

By Andrew Liszewski

Professional photographers (and apparently Autobots) with digital SLRs that still use a compact flash card might want to start saving their pennies for PhotoFast’s new CFast Gen1 CF cards. Available in 8, 16 or 32GB capacities the cards feature read speeds of up to 100MB/sec and write speeds of up to 50MB/sec thanks to a built-in SATA controller.

The CFast Flash Drive Series is the new and improved combination of CF and ATA Serial Transport (AST), it contains a SATA controller and flash memory in a (m)atchbook-sized package with a 7+17 pin connector consisting of 7-pin signal and 17-pin power and control connector. Within a maximum speed of SATA II 3.0 Gbps, this faster data throughput will make for increased performance in burst shooting modes and faster read times when you put the CFast card into a card reader to transfer to the computer.

There’s no word on pricing or availability just yet, but don’t expect the 32GB model to come cheap.

[ PhotoFast CFast Gen1 ] VIA [ Akihabara News ]

By Andrew Liszewski

Everyone knows they should be backing up their PC or laptop on a regular basis, but it usually requires a devastating loss of data before most users get serious about it. However, even if you have a giant RAID sitting on your desk, backing up your files on an hourly basis with ridiculous levels of redundancy, is your data still safe? Viruses and failed hardware are only a couple of problems a backup drive can protect against, but what about more serious situations like a flood, fire or other natural disasters? Should the worst case scenario occur, the data sitting on a backup drive next to your computer is just as much at risk as the data sitting on the computer itself.

Unless of course your data happens to be backed up on a drive that’s built like a tank. And that’s where the ioSafe Solo disaster proof external hard drive enters the picture. If you’re looking for a drive you can throw in your laptop bag the ioSafe Solo isn’t for you, but if you want a relatively affordable backup solution for your home or business that can withstand most of what mother nature can throw at it, you’ll want to check out my review of the Solo after the jump.

Read the rest of this entry »

By Andrew Liszewski

I’m not so sure if I like the weird wavy design of Verbatim’s new InSight external USB hard drives (though the glossy piano black finish is eye-catching) but I can definitely get behind the always on display which shows the drive’s name and available free space even when it’s disconnected from your PC. As far as I can tell the drives are available now in a 320GB capacity for $119.99 and 500GB for $149.99.

[ PR - Verbatim Launches InSight Portable USB Hard Drives with an Always On Display ] VIA [ Ubergizmo ]

By David Ponce

It’s not even close to Sony’s 2TB Memory Stick but at least it’s not a proprietary card. Toshiba’s just announced a 64GB card that employs the new SDXC (XC for extended capacity) memory standard. Problem is it won’t be available until spring 2010 and price is unknown yet as it’ll depend on market prices for flash memory at the time of launch. Toshiba claims write speeds of 35 megabytes per second and a read speed of 60 megabytes per second.

[ Press Release ] VIA [ BoingBoing Gadgets ]

By Andrew Liszewski

They might not be the first kid on the block with a 128GB flash drive, I believe Kingston took that honor a few months ago, but Corsair is claiming their new 128GB Voyager GT is the world’s fastest. Thanks to a “unique dual-controller architecture” the flash drive has a read speed of up to 32MB/sec and a write speed of up to 25.6MB/sec. The drive also features a durable and water-resistant rubber housing, so while it probably won’t survive a plunge under water, getting caught in the occasional spill shouldn’t be a problem. Available now, though pricing info wasn’t included in the PR.

[ Corsair Flash Voyager GT 128GB ]

By Andrew Liszewski

While flash cards with larger and larger capacities are inevitable, at one point I would have scoffed at a 64GB SD card as being completely unnecessary. But with more and more DSLRs using SD cards, getting bigger sensors and gaining the ability to capture hi-def video, a 64GB card not only makes sense, but is almost necessary. So congratulations to Toshiba who are the first to launch a 64GB SDXC card with 35MB per second write speeds and 60MB per second read speeds. The new card will also be available in 32GB and 16GB capacities (yawn!) and are set to go into production early next year.

[ PR - Toshiba to Launch World's First 64GB SDXC Card ] VIA [ Akihabara News ]