Buffalo stuffs 500GB into ultraslim HD-PVU2 portable hard drive

With a few external hard drive outfits pushing out 640GB models this past week, a simple half-terabyte edition now seems mildly inadequate. That said, Buffalo's latest gets brownie points for being almost impossibly thin. The HD-PVU2 lineup is barely thicker than the 2.5-inch HDD within, with 320GB and 500GB versions available. Both black and white flavors will be shipped out to stores, and as expected, they'll get all the juice they need through USB 2.0. Check 'em out soon (assuming you can locate one) in Japan for ¥10,500 ($112) and ¥15,330 ($164), respectively.

[Via Impress]

[Adamgs Posted Sep 7th 2009 8:46AM]

Honestly if a portable drive WAS much thicker than the 2.5" drive within i wouldnt be very happy. There isnt much to these things....

USB 2.0 is really starting to piss me off. Why are Intel delaying 3.0? It needed to be released over a year ago. Can you just imagine how long it would take to copy over 500gb of data? Its painful enough with Firewire 800....

[tezz27000 Posted Sep 7th 2009 9:02AM]

holy hell buffalo went out bought an off the rack internal hard drive and put it into an enclosure. Somebody quick give them a freakin' medal. I usually love engadget but this is pretty weak whats next... "man eats sandwich"?

[xCrunk Posted Sep 7th 2009 9:02AM]

Sorry guys, but this is lame.

I just picked up a Western Digital 2.5" USB 2.0 500GB Passport External HDD . I could literally stuff it in my pocket. And it was $110 at Best Buy, like two weeks ago.

So where is the wow factor in this story?

[a dark day Posted Sep 7th 2009 9:05AM]

considering my 9 month old 250gb 2.5 fits in my pocket, this is essentially a non-story

[Professor Kaos Posted Sep 7th 2009 9:45AM]

Exactly, I honestly consider this filler news, and a bad pull for story space at engadget. Either its a slow past couple of days of writers are slacking.

[fourthletter Posted Sep 7th 2009 9:17AM]

Looks just like the cheap metal 2.5" cases on ebay, Have you guys ever seen any other USB 2.5" drives this is neither special nor impossibly anything.

[alexdlc Posted Sep 7th 2009 9:25AM]

sorry, but, gizmodo hacked or just down? no offence engadget, love you too. lol

[Yemble Posted Sep 7th 2009 9:26AM]

I'll take the (slightly larger) Buffalo ministation turbo-usb model. The cable is attached to the case.

[Javanese Posted Sep 7th 2009 2:51PM]

Yup, not to mention tough as hell too. I dropped mine for the millionth time today on the tarmac and it still chugging along like a champ.

[uwspstar Posted Sep 7th 2009 1:58PM]

regular USB 2.0. , 500G cost $164, is it expensive ?

[Fir3lord Posted Sep 7th 2009 12:09PM]

they should just made this usb 3.0 or esata

[(Unverified) Posted Sep 7th 2009 12:33PM]

.

[(Unverified) Posted Sep 7th 2009 1:01PM]

sweet!

[(Unverified) Posted Sep 7th 2009 3:46PM]

I bought one of these in Japan (at BIC camera in Shibuya to be precise) two weeks ago. I just bought was seemed to be a reasonably priced, small 500GB external drive. I didn't think that it was that special compared to the others they had there.

p.s. It cost me Y16,500 or thereabouts, which seems a little high, but I was desperate for something as the drive on my work laptop was filling up with the photos I was taking.

p.p.s. I was more impressed by the fact they had a couple of USB 3.0 cables at the end of the aisle!