Engadget RSS Feed

DisplayLink shows off adapters and docks from HP, Lenovo, EVGA and Targus at IDF 2012

Michael Gorman — Sat, 15 Sep 2012 19:57:00 -0400

With the proliferation of Ultrabooks, laptops are shipping with fewer ports and smaller screens. One of the benficiaries of the streamlined designs is DisplayLink, whose technology can turn a single USB port into a bevy of connections. At IDF 2012, the company showed off new gear from several vendors, including EVGA, HP, Lenovo and Targus. First, there's a handsome little puck from EVGA, called the UV Plus+39, that plugs into your laptop's USB 2 or 3.0 socket to grant you HDMI and DVI output at up to 2048 x 1152 resolution for $85. Next up, Lenovo's self-explanatory USB 3.0 to DVI adapter that supports the same max resolution as the Plus+39 for $80. Lastly, a pair of docks from Targus and HP. HP's 3005pr USB 3.0 Port Replicator turns your laptop's USB 3.0 port into four USB 2.0, two USB 3.0, one HDMI, DisplayPort, and RJ-45 jacks, plus audio in and out connections for a mere $150. Targus' $250 USB 3.0 SuperSpeed Dual Video Docking Station has similar connectivity to HP's solution, but swaps DisplayPort for DVI and adds the ability to charge 90W laptops using its included array of power adapters. Having trouble deciding which one's for you? Perhaps our photos in the gallery below will help you decide.

Gallery: DisplayLink at IDF 2012

Myriam Joire contributed to this report.

Filed under: Peripherals

Comments

Source: EVGA, Lenovo, HP, Targus

LaCie reveals new Mac-friendly USB 3.0 external drives

Michael Gorman — Sat, 04 Aug 2012 22:01:00 -0400

Lacie's just announced its next generation USB 3.0 drives meant to take advantage of the new Ivy Bridge internals of the latest MacBooks. The fresh Rugged Triple, Porsche Design P'9223 and P'9233, and RuggedKey models all use USB Attached SCSI Protocol (UAS) for maximum data transfer speeds to and from machines running Lion or Mountain Lion. If you're looking to pick one of these slick storage devices, they'll be available in Apple stores and on LaCie's website this summer.

Filed under: Storage

Comments

ADATA S101 flash drive brings USB 3.0 speeds, shrugs off shocks and splashes

Mat Smith — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 13:17:00 -0500

USB flash drives may not be the hottest tech hardware out there, but that doesn't mean they can't look good. ADATA's latest thumb drive refresh packs the same military-spec rough and tumble credentials of last year's S007, but this time it's guarding some USB 3.0 goodness. While the design of the S107 is nigh-on identical to its predecessor, it's now capable of read speeds of up to 100MB per second. The rubberized storage sticks, available in red and blue, will be available in 8GB, 16GB and 32GB sizes, although ADATA is still keeping schtum on pricing and release dates.

Comments

Revved up USB 3.0 carries 10 times the power of Thunderbolt

Daniel Cooper — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 01:28:00 -0400

Wow. Those rockstars at the USB 3.0 promoter group haven't taken the threat of Thunderbolt lying down. They've been working long into the night (we imagine) screaming "More Power!" and "Liiiiive, damn you, liiiive!". In a press release, the group announces a new power delivery specification which will push USB 3.0's limit from 4.5 watts all the way up to 100. You all of course remember that Thunderbolt's maximum is a mere-by-comparison 10 watts. Brad Saunders, the promotion group's chairman, believes that the new standard could enable USB 3.0 to supply a laptop with energy at the same time as it delivers data between your devices. (After all that time sponging off your laptop's meager battery it's about time your USB-powered foot warmer started returning the favor.) At the moment it's only a specification and won't be implemented until 2012 at the earliest, but this could just turn into an arms race of electrifying proportions.

Comments

Samsung spices up the USB 3.0 hard drive party with three new models

Richard Lai — Tue, 04 Jan 2011 18:32:00 -0500

It's not the first time that Samsung's pimped up their hard drives with some USB 3.0 goodness, but come April, the Korean giant will be delivering three new product lines that are yet to be named. The first one is a basic portable model that goes up to 1TB, and comes encased in a smudge-resistant matte housing with a choice of four colors. The next one up is simply a premium version of the portable drive that not only looks prettier (as pictured above), but also beefed up with auto backup software and 256-bit Full Disk Encryption. A USB dock will be available for both portable lines.

Last but not least, those looking for more storage space (and presumably faster spinning speeds) can turn to the desktop version, which will be available in three flavors: 1TB, 1.5TB, and 2TB. Press release after the break.

Gallery: Samsung spices up the USB 3.0 hard drive party with three new models

Comments

NEC manages 16Gbps, tries to put a dimmer on Light Peak (updated)

Tim Stevens — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 11:26:00 -0500

If you didn't know it, there's a brewing interface war between the effortlessly backwards compatible USB 3.0 and the decidedly fresh break offered by Light Peak. Most people are fans of new stuff that works with their old stuff, but so too do people like stuff that's really fast, and USB 3.0's 5Gbps just can't match Light Peak's 10Gbps. ~~Or can it?~~ ~~NEC says it can, indicating that its USB 3.0~~ NEC has demonstrated a new chipset managing a whopping 16Gbps (2GB per second) over a single cable, finding a way to overcome ~~that standard's~~ signal interference problems to more than triple the USB 3.0's held ceiling. ~~It remains to be seen whether NEC's technique will be integrated into the still young 3.0 spec, but that would certainly be the logical thing to do.~~

Update: TheLostSwede commented to point us to an English version of the press release that, in Japanese form, seems to have led to the Electronista story we used as a source. Apparently something previously got lost in translation as the release actually talks about a wholly new inter-chip serial interface offering 16Gbps speeds, not an extension to USB 3.0. This could provide the system internals to shovel bits to whatever new external interface reigns supreme.

Comments

Buffalo SuperSpeed USB 3.0 external hard drive reviewed, fast

Joseph L. Flatley — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 10:04:00 -0500

Was anybody else surprised to see that Buffalo (fine purveyors of USB hardware, including kitschy dice speakers, and teeny, tiny thumb drives) was able to start pushing USB 3.0 hardware out the door so quickly? The fine citizens of TweakTown definitely were -- and now they've gone and given HD-HXU3 external hard drive a thorough going over. The verdict? They've likened performance to that of an internal drive -- not disappointing in the least. Physically, this guy is constructed "very well, much better than any of the enclosures that are sold without a drive" that the reviewer has tested. The only sticking point? The price seems a little steep -- and since USB 3.0 will soon be ubiquitous anyways, perhaps you want to hold out a minute before investing. But if the latest and greatest is your bag, this ain't a bad place to start. Hit the source link for the full story.

Comments

SuperSpeed USB 3.0 in action

Paul Miller — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 08:20:00 -0500

We dropped by to get a look at Symwave's SuperSpeed promised USB 3.0 setup, and got a real earful on the technology and its potential. Due to start shipping in devices near the end of the year, Symwave's chipset will hold up the device-end of the transaction, communicating with SATA for 2.5-inch and 3.5-inch drives. Since the host end of USB 3.0's plug is fully compatible with USB 2.0 (and 1.0, as it turns out), they expect folks to start buying future-proof USB 3.0 hard drives and wait for computer manufacturers to build it in -- or just grab a PCIe card if they're really enthusiastic. With around 10 times the headroom -- about 500MB a second -- of USB 2.0, the real bottleneck now is hard drive speeds. In the test we saw, the drive averaged around 78MB per second, and we can easily see SSD and RAID scenarios exploring this transfer speed. Their prototype setup to accomplish this was sprawling and a little bit ghetto, but by the time this is shipping in devices the chip will be shrunk down to about the size of a stamp. Action video is after the break.

Gallery: SuperSpeed USB 3.0 in action

Filed under: Peripherals, Storage

Comments

SuperSpeed USB 3.0 spec officially released, first chipset demonstrated

Nilay Patel — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 13:28:00 -0500

It's been nearly a year since we first saw the USB 3.0 connector make an appearance at CES, and after months of corporate infighting, spec-polishing, and technical navel-gazing, the future of consumer peripheral connectivity is here -- in the form of complete specifications and a demo. Yeah, so maybe SuperSpeed USB isn't making the most dramatic entrance ever, but hey, it doesn't have to with 4.8Gbps transfer speeds, improved power management, and backwards compatibility with USB 2.0 along for the ride. As expected, the first wave of devices won't hit until 2010, but Symwave's giving attendees of this week's SuperSpeed conference a taste of tomorrow with a demo of the Quasar USB 3.0 chipset, which is targeted at "sync-and-go" devices like phones and media players. Sounds lovely -- now if you'll excuse us, we have to go back to mourning the death of FireWire 400.

[Via Gearlog]

Read - SuperSpeed USB 3.0 spec released
Read - Symwave demos first USB 3.0 physical layer device

Filed under: Peripherals

Comments