ASKA intros HD32F PCMCIA hard drive

ExpressCards may have stolen their thunder, but all those PCMCIA slots out there are far from useless just yet, as evidenced by this latest product from Japan's ASKA Corporation. Its new HD32F portable hard drive will let you put that slot to use for some extra storage (either 20GB or 40GB), although you will have to put up with a rather large protuberance as a result (which you can pretty up a bit by sliding a picture into the drive's built-in picture frame). For non-PCMCIA use, the drive can also simply be plugged in using a USB cable. Look for this one to set you back ¥14,700 or ¥27,825 ($124-$235) depending on the size -- in Japan only, of course.

[Via Akihabara News]

[(Unverified) Posted Jul 27th 2007 9:36AM]

Why would anybody need this?

[jmarin Posted Jul 27th 2007 9:12PM]

Man doesn't this remind you of Star Trek?

Beam me up Scotty...

[gfar Posted Jul 27th 2007 10:08AM]

Well I don't know about you, but I know millions of people who have laptops with no USB ports and a PCMCIA slot just wasting away.

Unless they've got new laptops since 1995, then these are useless.

[Grey Acumen Posted Jul 27th 2007 11:14AM]

Quite frankly, I'd LOVE to have SOMETHING useful to put in the PCMCIA slot in my laptop, it gets no use and I quite frankly worry about dust getting in. Yet every single freaking card you can get for the thing sticks out what feels like 12 feet. It's not neccesary, the things have buttons you push to eject the cards, so why the need to make it stick out?
There are USB hubs small enough that I could fit them INSIDE that slot, but I have yet to see so much a single PCMCIA card that fits flush inside it.

This? This would be a great idea. But are you seriously telling me they couldn't just skip the damn picture and try to decrease the size an extra inch? Hell, if I got this, I'd probably never take it out. There is seriously no reason for this to be sticking out, more than likely, this is also a major reason why PCMCIA is dying out too.

[(Unverified) Posted Jul 27th 2007 1:26PM]

On the non-flush design issue, I hear you.

Worse still, the replacement to PCMCIA, which is ExpressCard, sticks out even more.


I am always worried an accidental jab to it might break the component loose.

[(Unverified) Posted Jul 27th 2007 11:39AM]

Well, my laptop's USB ports are always in use, and the PCMCIA port is NEVER in use...so I'd get great use out of this item.

I wonder if it'll work on North American machines.

[(Unverified) Posted Jul 28th 2007 12:35AM]

Come on people! 20 -40 GB is hopelessly outdated. Why would anyone need this? If you're lappy is that old that it doesn't have any USB ports, it's possibly time to throw it out me thinks... ;)

[pacmania1982 Posted Jul 27th 2007 12:21PM]

PCMCIA hard disk, how quaint....I remember these back in the day. Although they weren't in the same capacities as these drives.

Now if someone released a ExpressCard/34 hard disk then I might be interested....

pac

[murray Posted Jul 28th 2007 1:29PM]

omg. This is cool... for 1997. The only way these are good is if they're $10 each.