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Dell has continued to improve upon the Inspiron Mini 9 with new colors along with new features.  We saw those new colors hit the US market just a few days back, and now Dell has followed up with an even more welcomed addition—an optional 32GB SSD. 

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Remember that red colored Inspiron Mini 9 that Michael Dell was spotted carrying around during the All Things Digital conference this past May?  Well, it appears that some customers will soon be able to grab an Inspiron Mini 9 of their own in red, and also pink.  Dell has just released both new models, but sadly, as of now, they are available only in Japan. 

Additionally, and perhaps a little more exciting than the new colors, is the option of a larger SSD.  Customers in Japan can also now choose to get the “platinum package” which includes a 32GB SSD.  The Mini 9 with the larger SSD is retailing for ¥54,980 or about $565 US and also includes the standard 1.6GHz Atom processor, 1GB of RAM and Windows XP.

Hopefully, we will see the new colors make their way over outside of the Japanese market, or at the very least that larger storage option.

Via [PC Watch]

• Who’s On Crack in tech: Black Friday ‘08 edition
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The Eee PC has been the most popular net book since it started selling, namely because it was the first, but also because it is damn good at what it does. However a few people have some qualms with it, mainly about the fairly low storage that it offers: 12GB.  I know I could easily fill that in a day and obviously the people at the Japanese company GreenHouse agree with me as they have released some Eee PC hard drive upgrades.
You can now replace your measly 12GB SSD with either the 32GB or 64GB modules which will over quintuple your storage, making the Eee PC a much more attractive option.  The specifications aren’t awful (considering that it is for the Eee PC) with 35MB/s and 15MB/s, but comparing that to a desktop internal hard drive it is poor and even for a laptop it is slow.  What’s it cost to upgrade that Eee?  Keep reading.

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I really like simple things.  I got this press release today about a DIY (do it yourself) flash hard drive using little more than six SDHC cards.  SDHC cards are simple things.  This tech comes straight out of Germany and almost as good as that is, it sells for just $102 US (SDHC cards not included).

The Flexi-drive S2S is slim and supposedly fast.  The modular design can handle SD cards up to 32GB meaning you can build up to a 192GB drive.  And because it is a flash drive, it is silent, uses little power, and it typically unaffected by shock so its perfect for a drive on the go.  Sweet!

I can hear you asking about speed.  Sharkoon, the manufacturer, tested six 8GB SDHC memory cards with Class 6 speed ratings.  The drive was clocked at reading at 140 MB/s and a write speed of 115 MB/s with HD-Tune.  Respectable numbers for sure.  I wonder how it will fare in the real world.

The drive will be available from retail partners now.

Product page [Sharkoon]

• A good old fashioned way to keep your files safe
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Kingston’s Elite Pro line of SD cards just grew a little larger, now topping out at 32GB of storage. The new 32GB card joins the already existing lineup, which included a 4, 8 and 16GB card, and will retail for $308.

Personally, its a little expensive for my taste, but with today’s camera and camcorders capable of higher and higher qualities, it sounds like an option to at least consider. The 32GB Elite Pro SDHC card will be able to capture and store around 6,000 still images at a 10-megapixel quality or eight hours of video at a 6Mbps HD Extended recording quality.

Read [Kingston]

• SanDisk’s Cyber Monday deals
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• Dell adds 32GB SSD option on the Inspiron Mini 9

My 2GB USB drive works just fine for my purposes, but in case you need a lot of size, then you might want to consider this new 32GB flash drive by Transcend.

Dubbed the JetFlash V60, it sports a size similar to that of a AA battery - so it’s pretty small and easy to take places. Additionally, it comes with a whole slew of features integrated into it, such as Website AutoLogin, PC-Lock, Mobile Favorites, Secret-Zip encryption, Data Backup and Online Update. It works well with both Windows and Mac, and it even works with Linux.

So far, no word on availability, but expect it to retail for about $194, which isn’t too bad considering its storage capabilities.

Via [ubergizmo]

• More storage for the Eee PC
• Dell rolls out 32GB SSD equipped pink, red Inspiron Mini 9’s in Japan
• Dell adds 32GB SSD option on the Inspiron Mini 9

Creative seems to be making an attempt to offer the best value on a portable media player, with a few recent price cuts they are now offering the 4GB Zen for just $99 and the 8GB Zen for $149.

In the recent past we also saw the 32GB Zen drop to $299 and the 1GB Zen Stone going for as little as $30 bucks.

Product [Creative] Via [Engadget]

• Dell rolls out 32GB SSD equipped pink, red Inspiron Mini 9’s in Japan
• Dell adds 32GB SSD option on the Inspiron Mini 9
• Creative Vado HD pocket camcorder now available for pre-order

Panasonic has announced the “worlds first” Class 6 32GB SDHC memory card, the RP-SDV32GU1K and while it may not be the first 32GB SDHC memory card it is the first at a Class 6 speed. At Class 6 you will see a 20 MBs transfer rate and with the large storage available you can record up to 12 hours of high-def video or store about 12,320 10-megapixel images. The new 32GB card from Panasonic will be available in April and retail for $699.
Read [CNN Money] Via [Engadget]

• SanDisk’s Cyber Monday deals
• Dell adds 32GB SSD option on the Inspiron Mini 9
• Panasonic makes a move for 3D Blu-ray

Transcend has just announced a new 32GB CompactFlash card. The new larger card is part of their 133x CompactFlash line and operates in IDE PIO mode 6 and also Ultra DMA mode 4. It has the ability to read at up to 45MB per second and write at speeds up to 16MB per second. Excellent news with this model is that Transcend includes a lifetime warranty, pricing and availability information have not yet been announced.

Via [SlashGear]

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Panasonic aims to up the ante with the development of the world’s first 32GB SD High Capacity (SDHC) memory card with Class 6 speed specification. A prototype of this memory card will be displayed at Panasonic booth #9405 during the International CES 2008.

Ideal for recording high definition videos, this novel memory card has a double capacity of the regular 16GB SD card available in the market today and can store up to 8 hours of 1440 x 1080i High Definition video for your SD camcorders. For 1920 x 1080i full High Definition video, it can record for approximately 5 hours and 20 minutes. Usable capacity is 30,979 MB.

More importantly, it ensures high quality-recording given its maximum data transfer rate of 20MB per second and Class 6 speed specification. However, there are no details on the pricing and availability to retail stores yet.

Read Panasonic

• Panasonic makes a move for 3D Blu-ray
• Dell rolls out 32GB SSD equipped pink, red Inspiron Mini 9’s in Japan
• Dell adds 32GB SSD option on the Inspiron Mini 9