Gizmodo: External Hard Drive

Iomega Screenplay Mediaplayer HDD Does HD Upscaling

Kit Eaton — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 11:25:10 EDT

Iomega's new Screenplay HD Multimedia drive promises that you can "leave the PC behind" since it stores your movies, pics and tunes and connects directly to your HDTV. You simply save them via the USB2.0 connection, and it's standalone from there on. It can upscale to to 720p and 1080i, plays a wide bunch of formats and connects via HDMI, SCART, composite audio and video or coaxial S/PDIF. With 500GB inside it should be able to store about 750 hours of MPEG2 at 780 x 480 pixels: that's around 500 movies as we mentioned yesterday. It's available now for $218.45. [Iomega and TFTS]

External HD Concept Helps You Visualize Your Data Usage

Sean Fallon — Mon, 17 Dec 2007 19:40:45 EST

This external hard drive concept entitled "IVY" adds an interesting new aesthetic to a plain old drive via an OLED screen that visualizes the content of the hard disk. Inspired by Sequoiaview visualization software, IVY starts out life as a rather plain-looking disk. As you fill it up, the design changes in sync with the content. In essence, you can automatically decorate your drive with a cushion treemap design that continually evolves. Again, it is only a concept—but it is a particularly interesting looking one if I do say so myself. [Concept Page via Next Nature via about:blank]

Seagate FreeAgent Go Portable Hard Drive Review and Gallery

Matt Buchanan — Mon, 07 May 2007 22:34:31 EDT

Slickly designed external hard drives are all the rage lately, but we originally scoped out Seagate's FreeAgent line back at CES. The FreeAgent Go holds up to 160GB and with the included Ceedo virtualization software, you can run apps directly from the drive, which is useful if you're stuck using a public computer.

What'd we like? It's small, lightweight and quiet but feels surprisingly sturdy. It looks great and the yellow glow is nice, but if it's not for you, you can always turn it off. The read/write speed is average, so there's nothing to complain about there (you can scope out the benchmarks in the gallery). Apps run from the drive generally lag-free.

What we didn't like:

If you want to run a program from the drive not on Ceedo's list, it requires the Argo add-on, which is $20. This is made more frustrating by the fact that their site contains out-of-date applications—I want to run Thunderbird 2.0, not 1.5. Installing programs could be more elegant and intuitive. Also, virtualization doesn't work for Macs. Plus, we'd like (but admittedly don't need) a Firewire port.

Bottom line: If you're want a portable, external hard drive that'll turn heads and run reliably to cart stuff around and don't might paying a little bit extra, in terms of $ to GB, this isn't a bad a way to go. Running programs from the drive also works well for the most part, though it could (and should) be improved. – Matt Buchanan

Product Page [Seagate]

SimpleTech Revs Up New Ferrari-Designed External Hard Drives

Matt Buchanan — Mon, 09 Apr 2007 09:00:01 EDT

Fabrik Inc's dropping the latest line of Pininfarina-designed (as in Ferrari) SimpleTech-branded external hard drives. The new desktop SimpleDrives come in five colors and six sizes: fire red (160GB), pearl white (250GB), sapphire (320GB), onyx (500) and charcoal gray (750GB and 1TB), with the 160GB model starting at $100. All have a nifty blue circle of light on top showing you how much space you have left.

The storage is pricey on a data-to-dollars basis, but the included backup software claims to make the often tedious process of backing up and restoring data fairly effortless, and moreover, portable. But let's not kid ourselves here about what you're paying for: they look good and you get to say "Ferrari" whenever you tell your friends about them. Close-up after the jump.

– Matt Buchanan

Product Page [SimpleTech]

Iomega eSATA External Hard Drive

gizcontrib — Fri, 25 Aug 2006 13:20:44 EDT

External hard drives don't tend to be the most exciting things in the world: they just sit there and store stuff. But the new Iomega Desktop Hard Drive eSATA/USB 2.0 320 GB adds something new to the mix :an eSATA port, which connects to the external SATA port that's appearing on many new desktop and laptop PCs. The eSATA port is as fast as an internal SATA drive, but can be plugged and unplugged like a USB drive. The $240 drive comes with a PCI eSATA card if you don't have one. There's also a USB port. – Richard Baguley

320GB eSATA/USB Drive [Iomega]

Kouwell KW-7292 Fingerprint Disk

Charlie White — Thu, 29 Jun 2006 12:46:50 EDT

Getting paranoid these days? Taiwan's Kouwell offers its KW-7292 fingerprint disk, an external hard drive that won't let you access its data unless you've got the right fingerprint.

Its encryption can be configured more precisely, too, where you can designate specific folders that can only be accessed with fingerprint authentication. It's also able to synchronize its data with a PC via Outlook. Pricing and availability wasn't announced yet. – Charlie White

External hard disk with fingerprint sensor [AVing]

Seagate 750GB External Drive

Charlie White — Mon, 01 May 2006 10:28:14 EDT

We told you about the Seagate Barracuda 750GB internal hard disk, and now it looks like the company has dressed up that drive in a techno-fantabulous enclosure, offering it in external trim for a hefty $559.

The 3.5-inch 7200RPM hard drive uses the latest perpendicular recording technology, and can be hooked up via USB 2.0 or FireWire. Look for it in stores this month.

Seagate 750GB Pushbutton external hard drive [Newlaunches]