Gadgetell | Tech News, Reviews, and Interesting Things

Standing by their tag line, Fujitsu will truly “make your data portable” with its new Handy Drive 400, offering 400GB of space for any kind of digital contraption you can throw at it. The drive measures a convenient 3.23 x 5.57 x 0.87-inches and weighs 8.12-ounces. This 4200rpm hard drive will connect to your PC just fine over USB 2.0, although there’s no word whether this will support Firewire. Available now in Japan for 216€ or just a little over $330 USD. Yes, it’s pricey.

Via [Akihabara News]

It’s his last time to host a Microsoft CEO Summit as company chairman before answering philanthropy’s call, so Bill Gates decided to use the opportunity for one more demonstration of Microsoft Research prowess. Gates allowed the high-profile executives attending the annual meeting of high-dollar minds to see Microsoft’s Touch Wall, which threatens the existence of whiteboards and Magic Markers in all those sterile conference rooms around the world.

So far it’s been a good year for touch-screen technology, big and small; besides the iPhone and all its competitors, there’s the touch technology on display during coverage of primary elections on CNN. Microsoft’s offering is basically its Surface computer mounted vertically and expanded out to a 50-inch screen. Gates showed off interactivity with documents, Tablet-style writing and easy access to applications like PowerPoint, and promised that the technology would not be all that expensive. Still, after the showing this week in Redmond for the business elite, you can expect corner offices in corporate headquarters across America to be the first places for the Touch Wall to show up.

Read [Seattle Times]

The GBDisk RS1 series of Serial ATA (SATA)-compatible industrial silicon disks is the latest addition to TDK’s roster, which will be made available in June with up to 16GB capacities. High-speed, frequent data writing and maintaining data reliability come first with the GBDisk RS1 series. And because of that, it features single level cell (SLC) NAND Flash memory, and GBDriver RS1 SATA controllers for use in NAND Flash memory controller ICs.

It also offers complete power interruption tolerance, error correction, distributed data writing, and bad block management. Basically, these are new types of hard disks, coming in at the same size as current generation HDD’s (2.5-inches) that should offer fast start up, stringent shock resistance, and low power consumption. It’s been reported to be already Windows Hardware Quality Labs (WHQL)-certified, and now if only they could bump up the storage a bit more than 16GB’s, then we’d all be happy. Or at least, those who need to use hard disks in industrial equipment.

As of now, pricing is unknown, but as earlier mentioned, production will start in June 2008.

Via [Tech On]

Before Asus even launches its own desktop Eee PC, its rival MSI has already rolled out a competing product. MSI’s small new wonder is called the Titan, which aside from having a small profile, will also be small on price - at only £235 or about $450 USD, give or take a few. It measures only 9.45 x 7.28 x 2.75-inches, and yet it features a 250GB SATA hard drive, 2 GHz VIA C7 processor, 1GB of DDR 2 memory and VIA’s CN700 integrated chipset. Two USB ports, VGA, TV out, 5.1-channel digital audio out, legacy PS/2 and serial ports, and a Gigabit Ethernet port are all built-in to round out this little baby’s set of I/O ports. While a dual-layer multi-format DVD writer is included to take care of your home theater needs. The catch? It doesn’t come with an OS, which at first of course sucks, but you can bag Linux (what the original Eee PC used to ship with) for free easily anyway, so it’s still kind of OK.

Via [Register Hardware]

Looking for a creative (albeit a bit expensive) way to banish your computer’s data? EDR Solutions might have just the right thing for you. Cleverly disguised as a seemingly hibernating war machine, the Hard Disk Crusher will offer to ‘drill’ through your hard drive’s spindles, effectively killing it just like how crunch waves do brain cells. A standard 110V outlet should be enough to give this monster some juice, but in the unlikely event that you need to use this where there’s no electricity available, you can use an emergency hand-pump and crush hard drives 15 pumps at a time. How much is one Hard Disk Crusher to destroy all your unwanted data easily? $11,500 (including a one-year warranty, at $995 per year extended). The comfort in knowing that nobody will ever find all your precious “YouTube videos?” Priceless.

Via [Oh Gizmo]

Iomega has announced the new ScreenPlay HD Multimedia Drive, a portable external data storage device touting a 500GB storage capacity provided by a 3.5 inch 7200rpm NTSF formated hard drive.

The ScreenPlay HD Multimedia Drive comes with a remote control to help you navigate through your collection of digital content and has support for various media formats including MP3, AC3, WAV, WMA, MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4 and JPEG. It also features both HDMI and component video outputs that you can use to display high-resolution digital photos and video on your display of choice. With these connections, you can choose your preferred video settings from either 480i, 480p, 720p or 1080i.

The ScreenPlay HD Multimedia Drive is currently available in the US and retails for $209.95, and is expected to ship internationally sometime in May for around $282.

Via [Far East Gizmos]

ThinkGeek has begun to offer the highly desired Optimus Maximus keyboard, although currently out-of-stock, the item can now be ordered by anyone. Of course we say anyone with a little bit of sarcasm because not everyone is going to be willing to shell out the $1,589.99 that it retails for. The keyboard has 113 keys that are actually all individual OLED screens and each one can be programmed to do just about anything you can think of. The keyboard also has two USB ports and a SD card slot that is used for storage of the keyboard settings.

Just in case the keyboard is a little pricey for your budget, ThinkGeek is also carrying the Optimus Mini Three keyboard, which is a mini keyboard with three programmable keys. While not quite as cool as the full keyboard it retails for a much nicer $134.99. Sadly both items are currently listed as out of stock.

Product [Optimus Maximus keyboard] Product [Optimus Mini Three keyboard] Via [Wired]

At the Fortune Green conference, Dell CEO, Michael Dell was kind enough to show off their latest attempt at an environmentally friendly PC. Though still in the development process at the moment, Dell has begun boasting of the PC’s potential features. Purportedly, the device uses 70% less energy than most other desktop models and it is also 81% smaller than most desktop PC’s. Additionally, the mini PC will be made of recyclable items, thus helping reduce its carbon footprint and saving the world.

Okay, so saving the world may be a little bold, but it is a cool idea, and its nice to see a big company making an effort. The device has yet to be named, but the price expected to be between $500 and $700. Keep reading for a few more images of Dell’s eco-friendly PC…

MORE »

Planning on building that new gaming rig? Here’s some good news. Putting pressure on rival chip-maker Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), Intel has surprisingly halved the prices on its Core 2 Quad Q6700 (from $530 to $266) and Quad-Core Xeon X3230 (from $530 to $266). Overall, fourteen processors experienced a price cut, ranging from 12% to 50% off. Other CPUs with slashed prices include the Core 2 Quad Q6600 (from $266 to $244), Core 2 Duo E6850 (from $266 to $183), Dual-Core Xeon 3085 (from $366 to $188), Celeron 560 (from $134 to $107) and more. All prices reflect 1,000 unit shipments. The reason for the discounted prices is Intel’s transition from their 65nm to 45nm process. All of the chips on sale are based off of the old 65nm technology. AMD announced its plans to begin shipping their 45nm chips in fourth quarter 2008, which puts them one year behind Intel, who began selling their 45nm CPUs back in November 2007.

MORE »

Microsoft’s track record with regards to innovation isn’t something you can call spotless, but a recent patent filing puts them on track to beating the rest of the world in a classic case of “Why didn’t I think of that?” Their patent couldn’t get simpler. It’s called the Wearable computer pointing device, and is supposed to be an easier way to operate a mouse by wearing it in your hand. With the Wiimote and iPhone promoting all kinds of high-tech sensors, a device such as this just had to be concepted. Right? 

MORE »