Samsung's Black Edition Credit-Card Sized 1.8-inch HDs Are Tiny, Shiny

Samsung's taking its large-capacity 1.8-inch HDs (found inside the Macbook Air, iPod, etc) and throwing them into this sleek bus-powered credit-card-sized casing, which looks to be about as small a form factor we're going to see for a 1.8-inch drive. They're only available in Asia at the moment, and on the high end (120GB) they're pricey (almost $300, but available on Chinese sites for considerably less). On the low end, a 20GB version that can basically fit in your wallet is around $45—not bad, if you're not feeling the flash route. And the form factor is pretty hot; "The Storage World In Hand," indeed. [Everything USB via Gadget Lab]

Toshiba Beefs Up 5400rpm 1.8-Inch Drives to 160GB

Just a few months ago we reported that Toshiba had turned up the spin-speed on its 1.8-inch hard drives to 5400 rpm. And now Toshiba's squeezed yet more storage onto those tiny spinning platters, beefing the storage capactity up to 160GB. Apparently it's the industry's first such drive with a serial ATA interface and it's exactly the sort of thing that could become your ultra-portable PC's new best friend when it goes into mass production in August, alongside a smaller 80GB version. Full press release below. More »