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Belkin dishes out SOHO KVM at CES
Continuing on with its invigorating list of CES releases, Belkin is cranking out its SOHO KVM, which unsurprisingly enables users to "share one monitor, keyboard and mouse between two or more computers." Nothing here we haven't seen before, but it does include a handy USB port on the front for connecting up your iPod (Belkin's suggestion, not ours) while switching between computers. The unit itself is available in VGA or DVI / PS/2 or USB flavors and ranges from $159 to $269.
Acer kicks out Extensa 4620 laptops on the cheap
Sure, Acer may be marketing its Extensa lineup to small business owners, but there's nothing that says bargain hunters can get in on one, too. The 14.1-inch Extensa 4620 comes loaded with Windows XP Professional (sorry, Vista aficionados), 1GB of RAM, a 120GB hard drive, dual-layer DVD burner, 802.11a/b/g WiFi, gigabit Ethernet, a 56k modem, GMA 3100 graphics chipset and a six-cell Li-ion good for around two hours. The first of the two 4620 iterations (that'd be the 6294, break out the pencils!) sports an Intel Core 2 Duo T5450 CPU, while the 4620-4054 rocks a T2310. According to Acer, both of the lappies are available now throughout North America for $799 and $699, respectively.[Via I4U News]
Linksys branding not dead after all
Well, it looks like Cisco CEO John Chambers spoke a little too soon last Friday when he said that the Linksys brand was going the way of the dodo -- Cisco is now saying that it will continue selling Linksys-branded products "in the near term," and that changes would only come "if and when these changes add value to our customers' decision making processes." In other words, Linksys ain't dead yet, but the axe is still mighty close.
Netgear acquires Infrant to boost storage offerings
Hot on the heels of yet another big time acquisition between Philips and DLO comes news that Netgear will be snapping up the privately-held Infrant Technologies for a cool $60 million in cash. All 34 employees will soon be wearing Netgear badges, and Infrant's CEO will move over and become Netgear's Vice President and General Manager for storage products. Essentially, Netgear is hoping that this move will strengthen the firm's presence in the enterprise and small-business storage realm, as it can now offer up a trusted name in RAID-based NAS products for SMB, SOHO, and the home. More specifically, the ReadyNAS, RAIDiator, and X-RAID portfolios were the targets of Netgear's desire, and while details on branding and the timeframe for the merge weren't noted, it sounds like Netgear's ready to get this party started on the double.[Thanks, Matt]
MicroNet Platinum NAS 4.0 packs four 1TB SATA hard drives
Look out folks, as just one month after Buffalo cranked the NAS ante up to 3TB, we've got a new kid on the block holding down the mighty four-oh. MicroNet's Platinum NAS 4.0 indeed packs a whopping 4,000GB on just four SATA hard drives, and while the company didn't go out of its way to divulge exactly which units were stuffed within, we've all got our hunch. Regardless, this device also features 256MB of write-back / write-through error correcting cache memory, Windows / OS X / Linux compatibility, RAID 0/1/5 support, an Intel XScale 64-bit network storage processor, dual-channel gigabit Ethernet connectivity, a lightweight aluminum design, and it even consumes about "one-third less power" than similar alternatives. Cleverly, MicroNet only asserted that the 1TB edition would hit in Q2 for $879, but we're confident the flagship version will tack on quite a premium for all its capaciousness.[Via MacWorld]
Chronos replaces StickyBrain with SOHO Notes 5.5
StickyBrain, one of the leading 'digital junk drawer' apps that recently entered a 4.1 beta testing phase, has been officially discontinued by Chronos in favor of SOHO Notes 5.5. Current registered users of StickyBrain 4.0 will receive an upgrade to SOHO Notes for free, while users who own licenses for any previous StickyBrain versions (1.x, 2.x and 3.x) can upgrade to SOHO Notes 5.5 for a mere $25, the price offered in the past for upgrading from StickyBrain 3.x to 4.x.Why is StickyBrain being dissolved in favor of SOHO Notes, you ask? Chronos has published an announcement and FAQ explaining the decision, but here's the short version: SOHO Notes is basically the big brother of StickyBrain; they're almost the same app, derived from the same codebase, except SOHO Notes included three key features that Chronos used to charge extra for: SOHO Notes can synchronize notes between multiple computers using a .Mac account (seamlessly, in the background). SOHO Notes can access multiple note databases simultaneously. SOHO Notes is multi-user capable which means users can share notes with others over a network using the product's client/server technology. Now, with SOHO Notes taking the helm, its price has dropped to $39.99 to keep it more in-line with StickyBrain's previous price, as well as the competition like Yojimbo and DEVONthink. Feature-wise, this new version of SOHO Notes 5.5 offers some powerful new goodies, such as the ability to import and catalog almost any kind of file, send notes to your blog, a DockNote that makes it easy to get info both in and out, audio recording notes, full-screen editing of notes, a Daily Journal/Diary category that can automatically date/time stamp notes and much more.Whether you love your hate StickyBrain SOHO Notes, this should be good news for the 'digital junk drawer' market, as this price drop and the new features should help keep everyone's innovative juices flowing.
Mac-wielding celebrities
ifoAppleStore is pointing to a great Flickr find today: A (blurry) snapshot of John Stewart bringing his iMac into the SoHo Genius Bar for service (how he managed to get an appointment there I'll never know). The picture reminded me of these shots of John Krasinski from NBC's The Office checking out an iPod in an unidentified New York Apple Store. Since we don't venture out of our secret TUAW offices in the gymnasium of the abandoned parochial school with any great regularity, we don't get to see many Mac-toting celebs in the wild. So, we're posing the question to you: Have you ever made such a sighting?
