Could a 64GB iPhone 3GS be on the cards?

Or even a 128GB iPod Touch?

Toshiba will start producing 3 million units each month, from January 2010, which would be more than enough for a certain new iPhone 4 that's due around June. [CrunchGear]

Apple Said to Be Bullying, Giving Wedgies to Flash Memory Makers

Anyone surprised that Apple's been accused of practicing some, shall we say, Machiavellian business tactics? The Korea Times published a story in which anonymous representatives of Apple's major flash memory partners, Hynix and Samsung, accuse Apple of ordering more memory than needed, then buying the necessary (smaller) amount once the price drops due to that whole supply/demand see-saw. It winds up in Remainders because it's awfully insidery, and honestly we're pretty glad flash prices are so cheap (a 64GB iPod Touch would've been unthinkable three years ago). Sorry, Samsung/Hynix! If you just sock Apple one time right in the face, maybe they'll leave you alone. [Electronista]

Legendary German Camera-Maker Launches Really Boring Digital Cameras

Praktica, a camera-maker out of Dresden, Germany (hence the Vonnegut, ha ha aren't we so literary), has the stature of Zeiss and Leica in the film world. Yet the company's new point-and-shoot digital cameras are the more boring, style-less pieces of plastic I've seen in a long time. The 10- and 12-megapixel cameras feature the normal scene modes, SD/HC storage, video recording and either a 2.7- or 3.0-inch screen. They're a snore and a half and it looks like they may be Germany-only, to boot. [Engadget]

ClearPlay's Upscaling 1080p DVD Player Allows High-Definition Censorship

ClearPlay, a company known for implementing "content control" in their DVD players (basically allowing parents to turn off objectionable content), just moved into the future, sort of! It's not a Blu-ray player or a media streamer, that'd be actually timely, but it is an upconverting, 1080p DVD player—the first of its kind to feature content control. It's available now for $100. [Engadget]

Survey of Android App Developers Reveals Unhappiness With Sales

Okay so go find a heaping spoonful of rock salt that you can chew slowly as you read this story, because there are serious issues with it, but: A recent survey of Android app developers showed that the majority are not satisfied with app sales performance in the Marketplace. Most apps (over 90%) are downloaded less than 10,000 times, which is pretty minimal compared to the sales of apps in Apple App Store for Apps (apps).

Now, the rock salt. For a survey like this, you need a wide variety of developers, doing all different kinds of apps (entertainment, utility, whatever), and the survey assuredly doesn't have that—only thirty developers were polled, a low enough number that frankly I don't trust any conclusions gleaned. Besides, of course Android app sales are lower; Android hardware sales are lower, too, and the Marketplace is a lot younger and less-established than the App Store. Basically, I'm not saying it's wrong, but we really can't trust this survey. [GigaOm]

According to Samsung, their new chips are actually the slimmest ever and "40% thinner and lighter than a conventional memory package." Whether those details are true or not, I look forward to seeing them hit the market and start slipping into newer, smaller gadgets. [Information Week via Engadget]

It's anticipated that PCM will initially be considered too pricey once it does in fact become available to consumers, but what product doesn't start off like that? Once prices level out and potential issues are sorted out though, it's predicted that phase-changing memory will kill off flash. Makes sense, since there's no reason to settle for a less dense product when you could have stacks of memory that's just as non-volatile after all. [Ars Technica]

Right now, they're only shipping in 8GB and 16GB capacities, which have been long available, but soon they'll be releasing 64GB and even higher flash memory. The X4 tech doesn't yet extend to SSDs, though it's not really clear why, but it's still great news for us gadget hounds. Many smartphones, especially those running Android, WinMo and BlackBerry OS, rely on microSDHC cards for memory, and a 64GB or even higher capacity card would make those much more viable as, say, multimedia machines. SanDisk assures us that the price will not skyrocket, which is a relief. X4 chips should start appearing in stores very soon. [CNET]

Apparently, flash memory cells are highly receptive to light and capable of creating a completely digital image. A focused beam of light directed at sector on the chip becomes a pixel, no analog-to-digital conversion required. Flash memory sensors are up to 100x smaller than current CCDs, too. By my math, that means I could have a 200 megapixel camera in my pocket right now.

The drawback: small pixels are less receptive to light, which could mean problems as pixel density increases. The data also only comes in as binary, so grayscale is tricky. Regardless, the researchers are already achieving better grayscale and low-light performance than seen in CMOS sensors.

Edoardo Charbon and the rest of the team at the Technical University of Delft hope to have a working prototype by 2010. We're still waiting for response from Canon on the rumored, memory-sensor-based D40 Pico. [New Scientist via Wired]

The first 128GB USB flash drive we say, the Kingston Datatraveler 200, was mostly a proof of concept, with relatively slow read/write speeds of 20/10MB/s. It was also prohibitively expensive at nearly $550. Corsair's drive has the speed to be really enviable, and it comes in even cheaper than the Kingston drive. Note, however, that we didn't say it's affordable, at all—Newegg is selling it for $400. Still, it's pretty great to be able to carry around even a massive music collection in the change pocket of your jeans. [Corsair]

Toshiba's upcoming line update stretches from 16GB to 64GB, with read speeds of 60MB/s (that's megabytes, folks) and write speeds of 35MB/s. The one we're really interested in is obviously the 64GB SDXC unit, since prior SDXC cards, while fast, haven't hit capacities beyond the highest end of the SDHC spec. And look! Sample shipments for the largest card start arriving in November! That's great, if you're an OEM manufacturer. Regular folks will have to wait for "Spring, 2010" to splurge on one of these, however much it'll cost; these SD cards, which are literally from the future, haven't been priced yet. [Toshiba]

These cards are designed for HD video and are marketed with the new MacBook Pros in mind, since Apple's new laptops finally (finally!) have SD card slots. 30MB/s is easily fast enough to comfortably boot an OS from the card slot, which we already know is possible. Plus, with all the new DSLRs capable of taking HD video, more space and faster speeds might be of considerable use to photographers and videographers. The cards will be available this August for an undisclosed price. Press release follows. [SanDisk]

SANDISK UNVEILS WORLD'S FASTEST 32GB SDHC CARD

30MB/s Read & Write Speeds and 32GB Storage Capacity Help
Photography and Video Enthusiasts Do More With Their DSLRs

32GB CardPMA, Sydney, June 25, 2009 – SanDisk Corporation (NASDAQ:SNDK), the global leader in flash memory cards, today introduced the fastest 32-gigabyte (GB)1 SDHC™ card on the market. The 32GB SanDisk Extreme® SDHC™ card at up to 30 megabytes per second (MB/s)2 read and write speeds combines industry-leading performance with massive storage capacity, helping digital photography enthusiasts utilize the advanced features of today's DSLR cameras.

"The market for entry to mid-level DSLR cameras is growing, and SDHC is becoming the de-facto card format for these devices," said Susan Park, director, retail product marketing, SanDisk. "Our card's 32GB of storage and up to 30MB/s read & write speeds enable DSLR users to shoot without worrying about storage or speed limitations. SanDisk Extreme SDHC cards provide consumers with a more enjoyable user experience, letting them focus on what is really important – the images that they are capturing."

Lightning-Fast Write Speed Captures Images Quickly
A memory card's write speed plays a crucial role in the overall system of the camera when taking pictures in rapid succession. If a card cannot process data quickly enough then the burst mode shooting may pause unexpectedly as the card catches up to the camera. Burst mode bottlenecks can lead to missing "the" shot, especially at sporting or other fast-motion events. The SanDisk Extreme SDHC card offers maximum data-transfer rates, giving consumers a memory card fast enough to unlock the full capabilities of their DSLRs.

The 32GB SanDisk Extreme SDHC card adheres to the SD Association's new Class 10 specification, which exceeds requirement for today's high definition (AVCHD) video recording. The card offers a sustained write speed fast enough to ensure high-definition video recording and capacity capable of storing 160 minutes of full HD 1920x1080 pixels at 24Mb/s data transfer rate.

Big Files Require Big Storage
Recently-released DSLR camera models like the Nikon D90 and D5000 offer consumers the ability to record HD videos, producing large files that can fill lesser-capacity cards quickly. Today's high-megapixel DSLRs also can generate massive still images like those produced in the RAW format used by professional photographers who want to take advantage of the enhanced picture quality and flexibility that RAW allows during post production.

RAW images demand up to ten times as much storage space as regular JPEG images, and when taken in rapid succession during burst mode can quickly fill smaller storage cards. The 32GB SanDisk Extreme SDHC card can store up to 2500 RAW3 images, providing photographers with piece of mind and confidence that they will not run out of space for their images.

Renowned for their world-class durability, SanDisk Extreme SDHC cards guarantee operation at extended temperatures ranging from minus 13 F (minus 25 C) to 185 F (85 C). SanDisk Extreme SDHC cards are fully compatible with any camera, card reader or other device that supports SDHC cards.

When placed in SanDisk's new ImageMate® Multi-Card USB 2.0 reader/writer, the SanDisk Extreme SDHC card transfers images and video to a computer at rates of up to 30MB/s. The card's fast data transfer rates enable photographers operating under tight deadlines to maximize critical workflow and enter post production as quickly as possible.

Class 10 Performance Sets a New Standard
An SD™ card's speed Class is based on its minimum data-transfer rate, and is used to ensure high-quality video recording standards. The SD Association added Class 10 as part of the SD 3.0 specification released earlier this year. The SanDisk Extreme SDHC card's performance exceeds the requirements of even the highest-quality AVCHD video recording device, and is currently the fastest Class 10 card in the world.

Availability:
The SanDisk Extreme SDHC 32GB cards will be shipping worldwide to major retailers in August. Also in August, the current 4, 8 and 16GB capacity SanDisk Extreme SDHC cards will be upgraded from Class 6 to Class 104.

About SanDisk:
SanDisk Corporation is the global leader in flash memory cards – from research, manufacturing and product design to consumer branding and retail distribution. SanDisk's product portfolio includes flash memory cards for mobile phones, digital cameras and camcorders; digital audio/video players; USB flash drives for consumers and the enterprise; embedded memory for mobile devices; and solid state drives for computers. SanDisk (www.sandisk.com/corporate) is a Silicon Valley-based S&P 500 company with more than half its sales outside of the United States.

Unlike other SSDs, the X1 utilizes two types of memory—4GB DRAM and 4GB NAND aligned on a PCIe card. Because RAM can be volatile, the NAND kicks in and safely backs up the information. According to a PC Perspective review, the drive features "single sector IOPS (input/output operations per second) unmatched by any other device available" and has the benefit of a IOPS cost that is about 1/5 of the io-Drive.

So, essentially you are getting a lot of bang for your buck here—but at the end of the day you are still talking $1495 for a drive with 4GB capacity. Obviously, that means the majority of us will have to wait a while longer to experience this kind of performance. [DDRdrive and CNET and PC Perspective]

The Loverish line comes in four colors each and a read/write speed of 6.5MB/second. Pricing was not yet available, but it probably doesn't matter considering these most likely won't make it over to the States anytime soon. If and when it does, we're sure you'll be able to find it at a Hot Topic. [Elecom via Akihabara News]

The iPod Plug

While it in some ways seems like an example of a proprietary technology done right (it's solid, supports lots of connection types and has become basically ubiquitous), Old 30-Pin has quite a bit to feel bad about. Consider this: It single-handedly obliterated the non-iPod accessory market. Almost every MP3 player dock, FM transmitter or interfacing device supports this port exclusively—or with some feeble aux plug (cable not included) in the rear. And why shouldn't they? There are more 30-pin-jack iPods out there than there are all other MP3 players combined.

But it means Apple is stuck. An abrupt switch would be a disaster for third parties and customers alike (consider the outcry when the iPhone 3G wasn't compatible with some older 30-pin accessories) and it's not clear what they could switch to. Micro-USB probably doesn't have enough pins for all the various functions the port should serve, and switching to a solution that would, say, force users to connect both a power plug and and audio cable to a dock would seem like a step backwards. But hey, just because it's currently practical and ubiquitous doesn't mean it isn't evil. It's because of you, iPod jack, that my Sansa has about as many docking prospects as the average Giz writer.

Sprint and Verizon's Secret Shame: CDMA

To the end user, CDMA and GSM don't seem very different—Sprint, a CDMA carrier, offers the same services as AT&T, a GSM carrier—except when it comes to how they handle phones.

GSM phones are identified by the SIM card that they carry, which can be moved between phones at the user's will. Not so with America's other wireless standard. Effectively, a CDMA phone is like a GSM phone with the SIM card welded to its socket. Your CDMA phone is permanently locked to your carrier, and your mobile connection is permanently bound to your handset—unless your carrier is kind enough to authorize a transfer to another phone.

The presumably intentional effect is that there's no market for 3rd party hardware in CDMA, which is fine for carriers, shitty for customers. Worst of all, there's no good reason for this. CDMA SIM cards exist. They're called R-UIM cards, but US carriers are in no rush to implement them.

The Battle of the Redundant Audio Formats

There was a time when it wasn't clear which stupid format would reign supreme, Microsoft's WMA or Apple's AAC. [Note: Yes, Apple didn't invent AAC. However, they are the only reason any of us have heard of it.] While each technically brought improved sound quality, they were both bastards born of the same greedy combination: the desire for DRM and the unwillingness to pay MP3 encoder/decoder royalties. Your AACs wouldn't play on your Zen; your WMAs wouldn't work on your iPod; your ATRAC3s wouldn't work on anything. These formats only grew popular because people accidentally used them to rip their music, and later, because they were an unavoidable part of the digital music purchasing process.

With wider format support in new players, the slow death of the all-you-can-download rental WMA stores and Apple's new "our bad!" attitude towards audio DRM, it seems like we're taking a healthy step back to good ole' em-pee-threes. And while iPods will never play WMA, iTunes does convert 'em. And it's nice to see more Microsoft products supporting AAC, which Apple still won't shake off.

A Unique Phone Charger for Every Phone

Even—or rather, especially—when phone plugs were only for electricity, every goddamn manufacturer had their own exclusive, silly connector for dumping current into batteries. Today, little has changed, and as virtually anyone who owns a cellphone knows, this sucks. A lost charger means your phone is out of commission, and because of carrier subsidies, a new charger sometimes costs more than the phone itself did.

And that's how we arrive at the reason for this stupid situation: Unique chargers=$$$ for cellphones makers. This would explain why the first substantive call for standardization came so recently, and why Nokia, Samsung, Motorola, Apple and pretty much everyone else still, in 2008, enforce phone-charger monogamy. And if you think phones are a pain, try finding a replacement charger for your Bluetooth headset. Good luck.

A Raw File By Any Other Name...

R-A-W. If you care about digital photography, these three letters form the most beautiful sound in the English language. Raw images, supported by almost every new DSLR and an increasing number of point-and-shoots, are made up of the 'raw' image data, pulled directly from your camera's sensor, letting you change all kinds of parameters—white balance, exposure and noise reduction, to name a few—instead of letting the camera pick them automatically during the shooting. And you can make infinite changes and tweaks long after the photo has been taken.

It would seem that by now importing raw files should be as easy as transferring JPEGs. Well, it's not. The problem is that almost every camera maker has insisted on using their own slightly different version, meaning that you either have to use your camera's supplied raw conversion software (almost always a steaming pile) or invest in a wide-support program like Photoshop, Aperture or Lightroom—and make sure it has the right compatibility. Come on guys, Adobe gave you a perfectly fine, royalty-free raw format back in 2004. Use it.

So Many Memory Cards

For years, everyone had their own memory card format: Sony products used Memory Sticks, Olympus used xD, Fujifilm used SmartMedia and so on... they all thought they had the heir to the 35mm/CD/Zip Drive throne. It was adorable! Now, it's not. While we were all busy stockpiling one soon-to-be-obsolete memory cards and multi-compatible (bit never totally compatible) readers, most of the electronics industry was aligning itself with a winner.

Two, actually—or maybe three. SD cards (backed by Panasonic) are cheap, compact and capacious and only getting better, with MicroSD as its tiny phone version. Meanwhile, beefier, more durable Compact Flash cards suit the serious photogs. The rest of you: You all do the exact same thing! Please die.

For Our Earphones Only: Non-Standard Headset Jacks

When a little metal trim kept the original iPhone from accepting regular old 3.5mm headphones, a lot of people almost blew a gasket, and rightfully so. It seemed hopeless: Even a phone that was more iPod than handset couldn't resist the allure of proprietary earphones.

Phones have always been terrible for this. The same varied, awkward orifices that charged your old phone probably served as its headset connector too, leaving you stuck with the flimsy, tinny OEM earbuds or an easy-to-lose adapter to deal with. For a while though, it seemed like companies were starting to catch the drift, as standard 3.5mm headphone/mic jacks became more and commonplace in music phones. But a Nokia or two is little comfort; HTC's newest Android phone, a multimedia powerhouse, only has a USB port. Apple's new Shuffle—a friggin' iPod-only works with the supplied earphones or special replacements. Grief ensues.

Sony's Entire Oeuvre

The story of Sony is like an exaggerated summary of the history of proprietary goofs. Sony entering a new market=Sony introducing a new, frustratingly exclusive format, plug, codec or device standard. With audio, it was MiniDiscs and ATRAC; on the PSP, you got UMD; for cameras and other portable devices, the Memory Stick. In video, there was Betamax, Laserdisc, HDV, and now Blu-ray. Yeah, this last one is sorta successful, but only because Sony decided to fight like there was no tomorrow to beat its rival format. [Blam: I'm not apologizing for the past, but Sony's promised to better about open formats going forward.] It worked this time, but God only knows what Sony labs have in store for us, and our shrinking wallets, next.

Did we leave out any nasty ones, like Nintendo's many accessories, or an Apple USB port that doesn't take all USB products? If you have a good one, throw it into a comment below.

Fusion-io has also blown the slot capacity of their previous model out of the water with versions of the PCI Express Duo available in 160GB, 320GB, 640GB and 1.28TB sizes. Three of the four versions will be available starting in April with the 1.28GB version slated for the second half of 2009. If you are wondering how much it will cost, that probably means you cant afford it. Specifics have not been made available, but we are talking tens of thousands of dollars on the high end here.

If you recognize Fusion-io, it's the company Woz just joined as Chief Scientist. Since he just joined, we doubt he had anything to do with the ioDrive's inception and production, but he'll most likely have a hand in doing their upcoming products. [Fusion-io via Hot Hardware]

The SDXC standard claims a maximum capacity of 2TB, with read/write speeds of up to 104MB/s. There's no doubt that, at 50MB/s, Pretec has achieved impressive speeds, but the company probably should have waited until they could put together an SDXC card with a greater actual capacity than existing SDHC products. Still, to see an actual product so soon after the standard was announced is heartening, although Pretec hasn't yet hinted at a price or release date. [Pretec via Impress Watch]

As JKOnTheRun points out, these are not the blazing-est SSDs you'll find (they're rated at 90 MB/s read and 55 MB/s write), but for $169 it's not a bad boost for your S101's paltry 16GB drive. [Super Talent via JKOnTheRun]

With Valentine's Day a little over a month away, we're all scratching our heads as to how to get our loved ones jewelry that we can actually play with. Luckily, the $33 USB Thumb Drive Bracelet showed up just in time to ship from overseas. Hiding a discreet 8GB of fold-out USB flash storage behind two dazzling lines of glued-on "decorative crystals," your girlfriend will just think you're cheap. But you'll know the truth.

(Well, you are cheap, and the bracelet has a hidden USB drive). [Brando]

To put it into perspective, that's nearly 2x the read speed of Intel's already fast SSDs, and roughly 5x the write speed. The ioDrive uses the same NAND flash memory of an SSD, but since it plugs in to a PCI Express bus rather than SATA and only works with 64-bit systems, it can achieve speeds nothing else can touch. And yes, here we are talking megaBYTEs, not megaBITs—a lower metric often used for data transmission speeds.

For now it's for enterprise stuff exlusively—an 80GB version will set you back $3,000, on up to $14,400 for 320GB. If you are interested in this kind of thing, the boys at Tweaktown have written a ten pager on it. [Tweaktown via BBG]