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eSATA

New Thunderbolt dock includes optical drive

Sonnet Technologies has debuted its Echo 15 Thunderbolt Dock, which includes a number of ports and options that is intended to be an all-in-one solution to I/O needs for systems with Thunderbolt connectors.

As portable systems get smaller and adopt high-speed universal I/O technologies such as Thunderbolt, more peripheral and docking solutions that use this technology are being introduced. Since a single-port solution is a popular choice for notebook users, a number of companies have promised Thunderbolt-based docking options that can link all peripherals to a portable system directly via its Thunderbolt connection.

One of the first of … Read more

LaCie one-ups itself with dual-drive Thunderbolt storage

LaCie, one of the first companies out of the gate last year with storage using Intel's fast Thunderbolt interface, introduced a dual-drive system called the 2big today at CES.

The 2big can be configured with two drives paired for high performance and capacity (RAID 0) or for high reliability by mirroring (RAID 1). Some people will appreciate fast backups, no doubt, but it seems likely that those willing to spring for Thunderbolt will be more inclined to take the performance route.

In addition, LaCie introduced its eSATA Hub Thunderbolt Series. eSATA is an external version of the usual internal … Read more

Get a 1.5TB external hard drive for $99.99 shipped

Hard-drive prices, oy.

As you may have heard, flooding in Thailand last year damaged factories involved in hard-drive production, creating shortages and sending drive prices skyrocketing in the last couple months.

Indeed, back in October, today's deal wouldn't have been much of a deal at all. Today, it's downright stellar.

While supplies last, Buy.com has the Fantom GreenDrive 1.5TB external hard drive for $99.99 shipped.

Granted, 2TB drives were routinely selling for $70 to $80 not long ago, but beggars can't be choosers right now. This is one of the best storage deals … Read more

LaCie turns Thunderbolt budget-friendly with eSATA hub

LAS VEGAS--If you have a Thunderbolt-enabled computer but just can't afford Thunderbolt storage, LaCie has something that will ease the pain.

The company showed off at the start of CES the first Thunderbolt hub that also supports an eSATA connection, called the eSATA Hub Thunderbolt Series.

This is a device about the size of a portable external drive that comes with two Thunderbolt ports and two eSATA ports. Users can connect up to two eSATA drives to the hub and it will instantly make them work with a host computer via one Thunderbolt port. With the other port, you … Read more

Western Digital unveils 6TB external drive

Western Digital has launched a new external drive that offers 6 terabytes of storage.

Unveiled today, the latest edition to the company's My Book Studio Edition II product line upgrades the storage space of 4TB and 2TB offered by earlier models. But by housing two hard disks internally, the new version maintains the same dimensions, shape, and weight as its lower-capacity cousins.

Selling for $549.99, the new My Book Studio Edition II 6TB drive is being geared more toward the Mac than Windows. Western Digital is targeting it specifically to creative pros and businesses that need to store … Read more

Get a 1TB external hard drive for $47.59

Hard drive prices continue to creep lower and lower, as evidenced by this so-low-I-can't-believe-it deal from MacMall: the 1TB Fantom GreenDrive external eSATA/USB hard drive for $47.59 shipped.

That's after redeeming a pair of mail-in rebates totaling $30, but it's still the lowest net price I've ever seen on a 1TB external drive.

Update: Please be sure to read the comments before ordering. It seems a number of users have had problems in the past with one of the two rebates. Consequently, you might want to steer clear of this deal.

Although it's … Read more

Get a 1TB external hard drive for $50

How low can a terabyte of external storage go? I've seen the drives hit $90, then $80, and even occasionally the $70 mark. But $50? That's new. And awesome.

MacMall has the Fantom GreenDrive GD1000EU 1TB external hard drive for $49.99 (plus $9 or so for shipping). What's the catch? I call it rebate No. 1 and rebate No. 2.

Yep, the drive will cost you $99.99 up front, then end up at $49.99 after a pair of $25 rebate checks roll in (one each from Fantom and MacMall). I know that's a … Read more

Get a 1TB external hard drive for $69.99 shipped

Buy.com once again has a Fantom G-Force 1-terabyte external hard drive for $69.99 with free shipping.

What's the catch? It's the same as last time: a $25 mail-in rebate (PDF). I know that's a deal breaker for some people, but I think rebate fulfillment problems are fewer than they've ever been. You can laugh at me all you want, but I think Buy.com is one of the Web's more reliable vendors.

The drive has USB 2.0 and eSATA interfaces and a 32MB external cache. It's Mac and Windows compatible and … Read more

A hard-drive standard flops outside the box

You'd be hard-pressed to find standards as ubiquitous as SATA, which is used to plug hard drives into computers. But its success inside the computer chassis turns out to have been a bad predictor of its success outside.

Years ago, SATA allies created a variation of the specification called eSATA that would let people attach hard external hard drives to computers. The big advantage over USB: an eSATA drive reads and writes data just as fast as an internal drive.

Despite its branding disaster of a name--eSATA stands for External Serial AT Attachment, and AT stands for nothing in particular--eSATA achieved some measure of success. I for one am glad it exists as a way to give laptops some measure of storage expandability of desktop machines. But overall, it never built critical mass, and I believe new technologies that match its speed and exceed its breadth will consign it to obscurity among mainstream computer users.

The nearest competitive threat is the new USB 3.0 "SuperSpeed," which offers transfer speeds of 5 gigabits per second compared to the 480 megabits per second of the currently prevailing version of the multipurpose Universal Serial Bus technology.

The new USB version is just now assuming the throne after a dangerously long reign by its predecessor. The first hard drives supporting it are on the market, and soon it will become mandatory in PCs. … Read more