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LaCie's Hub4 quadruples your USB 3.0 pleasure
Even in their prime, USB hubs were never the sexiest part of a tech geek's shopping trip -- people would typically grab the most functional (or crazy) looking option and move on to picking out their next set of "future-proof" RAM sticks. We're not convinced LaCie's really going to change all that with its Hub4, but it sure is trying hard by giving it a curvaceous exterior and those oh-so-desirable blue USB jacks. Yes, the USB 3.0 color coding is large and in charge here, highlighting a full quartet of ports for all that SuperSpeed gear you've been stashing. Of course, you'll still need at least one 3.0 connector on your computer to make the most of this USB peripheral (otherwise you'll have a very curvy and very standard USB 2.0 hub), but if that's already accounted for, you'll just need $59.99 and the source link to get yourself connected to the future.
LaCie serves up SSD-based USB 3.0 FastKey, charges a pretty penny for it
Get it straight, vaquero -- this ain't your mum's flash drive. LaCie's newest diminutive slab of aluminum is a solid state drive for your keyring, boasting transfer rates as high as 260MB/sec, 30/60/120GB capacities, a rugged metal casing and a USB 3.0 interface. You'll also get AES 256-bit encryption and 4GB of online-accessible Wuala storage, but you best not lose it. LaCie will be dinging your credit card for $149.99, $249.99 or $479.99 from least capacious to most, so you may want to take out an insurance policy on this guy before taking it out into the wild. Safety first and all. %Gallery-107781%
LaCie introduces Philippe Starck designed USB 3.0 portable drive
LaCie has long been associated with producing external hard drives for Macs, having created a wide array of FireWire drives. Now that the old standard is moving toward obsolescence, the accessory maker has now released a fresh USB 3.0 version of its Philippe Stark designed portable drive. Fortunately, LaCie has at least partly addressed the fact that Apple has neglected to install USB 3.0 ports on any of its products. If you have a Mac Pro or older MacBook Pro with PCI Express or ExpressCard slots, you can get an adapter for the new drive. Barring that option, you can still use the new drive with an existing port at USB 2.0 speeds. The drive has backup software preloaded, and LaCie also provides 10GB of cloud storage at Wuala Online for the first year. The 3.0 drive is initially available in a 500GB size that starts at US$109.
LaCie speeds up Philippe Starck mobile hard drive with USB 3.0
We've always been fans of LaCie's Starck Mobile Drives, designed by the inimitable Phillip Starck, and now they're getting a little speed boost, courtesy of USB 3.0. The 500GB drive is still housed in the same "liquid metal trapped in a box" enclosure as the previous editions, and it comes bundled with 10GB of online storage at Wuala Online for $109 in the US and £89 in the UK. Looks like it's out of stock just at the moment, but we'd imagine it'll arrive soon. Shot of the back and PR after the break.
LaCie offers USB 3.0 to Mac users
Cupertino may not be ready to offer us USB 3.0 quite yet, but LaCie is. The company has announced the availability of both the USB 3.0 PCI Express Card and the USB 3.0 ExpressCard/34 with Mac compatibility. To get things working, just install the free driver and pop in your card of choice. You'll be able to use any USB 3.0 compatible device with your Mac at will. Of course, your existing USB ports will continue to run at their default speed. These aren't magic cards, after all. The PCIe card will run you US$49.99 while the ExpressCard costs $59.99. But hey, if you've got $2,499 for a base Mac Pro, fifty bucks won't break the bank. [Via Engadget]
LaCie brings USB 3.0 to Mac: all you need is a driver and an expansion card
Everyone at once: "freakin' finally!" While PCs -- even lowly netbooks -- have been enjoying the spoils of SuperSpeed USB for months on end, those in the Mac realm... well, haven't. We've even seen purported email replies from Steve Jobs noting that USB 3.0 simply isn't mainstream enough to be included as standard gear on new Macs, but that's not stopping LaCie from hurdling the hurdles that lie ahead. The company has just announced bona fide USB 3.0 support for OS X, but the unfortunate part is that new hardware is still required; not only will you need a gratis USB 3.0 driver, you'll also need a LaCie USB 3.0 expansion card ($49.99 for PCIe; $59.99 for ExpressCard). In other words, LaCie's USB 3.0 driver won't magically make any ole USB 3.0 PCIe card play nice in your Mac Pro. But hey, there's always hope, and frankly, hope's all ya need.
LaCie slams 3TB drives into d2 USB 3.0 and LaCie 2big USB 3.0, ups performance numbers
Do you have The Need? For Speed? Yeah, so do we, and it just so happens that LaCie does as well. Just weeks after the company properly introduced the "now shipping" status on its d2 USB 3.0 and 2big USB 3.0 drives, it has now expanded the options with a 6TB model. So far as we can tell, it looks as if the outfit placed a rather sizable order for those 3TB HDDs that were just unleashed by Western Digital, and it has tuned up the performance all the while. The 2big has reached 306MB/sec in the lab, representing a 20 percent speed boost over the prior models while making it "the fastest 2-bay RAID solution on the market." As for the d2? It can hum along at 156MB/sec with the inclusion of a 3TB hard drive. Both units are slated to hit retail next month, but asking prices are being kept under wraps for now.
LaCie pushes serious pixels on 24-inch 324i professional IPS display
Need a few new pixels to display your shiny new digital images on? LaCie's got you covered, with its new 324i offering a premium feature set to accompany a premium price. Aimed specifically at creative pros with the pockets to appreciate a 10-bit P-IPS panel, exceedingly wide color gamuts (102 percent NTSC; 98 percent Adobe RGB), a slew of input connectors (DVI-D, HDMI, component and DisplayPort), 178-degree viewing angles and an anti-glare coating. The 24-inch panel boasts a 1920 x 1200 resolution, and the multifunction stand enables users to pivot the display for horizontal or vertical viewing. We gawked at it for a few minutes here at Photokina, and while the design is thoroughly corporate, the picture quality is indeed stunning. Other specs include a 1000:1 contrast ratio, a trio of USB 2.0 ports and an integrated cable manager; she's on sale today for a stiff $1,249.99, but man, we'd almost pay it for that anti-glare action. %Gallery-102790% %Gallery-102883%
LaCie Wireless Space takes on Time Capsule, doubles as NAS and WLAN router
And here you were thinking the upcoming Photokina trade show was all about cameras. Not so, vaquero. Granted, LaCie's probably taking advantage of this here event to reveal its latest and greatest media storage device, but we digress. The newly announced Wireless Space is perhaps the most interested and multifaceted device to emerge from the company in quite some time, and to say it's taking on Apple's Time Capsule would be understating things tremendously. In essence, what we have here is a NAS backup drive and an 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi access point / router, all bundled into one delicious black box. Available in 1TB and 2TB flavors, the Space enables both Mac and PC users both to backup their files wirelessly (or via cabling, should you so choose), and it also acts as a network hard drive for accessing files remotely, a UPnP / DLNA media streamer and a full-on router should you need one. It's fully compatible with Time Machine, and you'll also find a trio of Ethernet sockets and a pair of USB jacks on the rear. It's shipping today for $229.99 and $349.99, respectively, leaving Apple the loser once again in the price department. Is that a war we smell brewin'? %Gallery-102434%
LaCie ships 2big USB 3.0 RAID drive and d2 USB 3.0 external HDD
Talk about taking your sweet time. LaCie actually announced that it would be shipping a USB 3.0 version of its 2big USB 3.0 RAID monster in December of last year, but as you well know, the adoption of SuperSpeed has been less than blisteringly fast. At long last, the storage mainstay has decided to start shipping the aforementioned device, available with a pair of 7200rpm HDDs (up to 4TB total) and a promised maximum transfer rate of 205MB/sec. In case that's too heavy for your soul, the now-available d2 USB 3.0 might be the perfect alternative. The design won't be unfamiliar to LaCie loyalists, but the single-drive unit is making its way out in 1TB ($149.99) and 2TB ($249.99) sizes with a maximum transfer rate of 130MB/sec. So, you in? Or do you still think eSATA may swoop in and destroy USB 3.0, Blu-ray style? %Gallery-102175%
Intel's Light Peak optical interconnect shrinks slightly, LaCie, WD, Compal and Avid begin prototyping
Intel's Light Peak isn't setting any new speed records at IDF 2010 -- it's still rated at 10Gbps for now -- but the optical data transfer system is finally looking like it might appear in some actual products. As you can see immediately above, a Light Peak to HDMI converter has shrunk considerably since May, and a number of optically-infused sample products were on display at Intel's Light Peak booth. Compal's got a laptop with the optical interconnect built in, while Western Digital showed an external hard drive, from which the Compal could pull and edit multimedia in real-time using a Light Peak-enabled Avid rackmount. Meanwhile, LaCie showed off what appeared to be a 4big Quadra RAID array with two Light Peak ports catapulting high-definition video content at 770MB/s to a nearby Samsung TV, though we should warn you that the TV itself was a bit of a hack job, and not a collaboration with Samsung -- note the big, honking EVGA video card sticking out of the back. Though obviously a good bit of work went into these prototypes, Intel reps told us none would necessarily become a reality. Either way, don't expect to see Light Peak products until sometime next year.
LaCie embraces USB 3.0 with world's smallest hug, 'world's smallest' HDDs
LaCie's bringing its monkey out to play again today, announcing a USB 3.0 version of the Rikiki and a new Minimus portable hard drive. Both come in slick aluminum enclosures, with the Rikiki looking unchanged from its predecessor, but of course inside they pack the extra vroom vroom of the latest USB spec. Unlike Iomega, LaCie isn't shy about price premiums here, as the Rikiki USB 3.0 model costs $100 for 500GB (versus $85 for the 2.0 SKU) and the Minimus offers a terabyte in exchange for $130. Both will have larger options as well, a 1TB Rikiki and a 2TB Minimus -- with correspondingly elevated levies, we're sure.%Gallery-101772%%Gallery-101773%
LaCie MosKeyto streamlines portable storage, invites bad puns
LaCie's keeping up its eccentric branding strategy today with this pest-inspired new USB key. Measuring a mere 20mm in length and 10 grams in weight, the MosKeyto is ready to all but disappear once you plug it into your computer, and it'll outdo its physical counterpart by not only sucking data down but pushing it back out should you want it. Basically, it's yet another miniaturized USB drive and can be owned today, starting at $18 for the 4GB version. 8GB will set you back $28 and there's a 16GB variant to come as well. Got all that? Good. Now buzz off.%Gallery-101243%
LaCie Rikiki Go external HDD features 1TB storage, new and improved monkey
How do you differentiate one portable HDD from the next? Well, let's see: You can bump the storage capacity up to 1TB. Or you can give the monkey a mohawk. Yep, that's pretty much it! The Rikiki Go supports USB 2.0, sports an aluminum case, and is available now (with 1TB capacity) for $150. There is also a 500GB version that's not yet in stock, but will be at some point for $90. PR after the break.
LaCie's Windows Home Server-powered 5big Backup Server now shipping for big money
The last we heard from LaCie about its upcoming home server we didn't know much more than five bays inside, gigabit Ethernet on the back, and Windows Home Server running the show. Seven months on it's now available and we have all the details you could want. The 5big Backup Server apes the vaguely HAL 9000esque styling of earlier 5big storage devices, contains an Intel Atom D410 processor, manages up to 10TB of storage across those five bays, and offers four USB and one eSATA ports around back if you need more, more, more. Through WHS you can naturally support the backup needs of 10 PCs and there's also Time Machine support for 25 more fruity clients. The cost? You can get one with five 1TB drives for $1,199.99 (€1,239 in Europe), a bit of a premium over a comparable equipped HP Storageworks WHS box -- such is the cost of good aesthetics.
LaCie's XtremKey tested... emotionally (video)
Look, we all know that the wusses at the Engadget HQ couldn't put a dent in LaCie's ultra-rugged XtremKey, not even if their moms packed handguns in their fanny packs alongside the Fruit Roll-Ups, Mace, and wads of PR bribe cash. So we decided to take a different angle in testing the drive: we decided to bum it out. Watch the video after the break.
LaCie's XtremKey: it's pretty rugged, we guess
OK GUYS, WE GET IT. Sheesh, it's like they think we're a bunch of klutzes or something. Sure, there was that one time with the garbage disposal... one time. But after that... alright, the time with the mud, and the thing with the ocean. Oh, and when we dropped 2GB of Word documents into a black hole. Still, we hardly deserve to be treated like children. LaCie has stepped up the condescension to new levels with its XtremKey, a drive that's waterproof up to 100 meters, temperature proof from -58 degrees Fahrenheit to +400, and resistant to 16 foot drops. This ruggedness is accomplished by screwing the USB drive into a 2mm thick metal pipe that can withstand the pressure of a 10 ton truck rolling over it. Like that would ever happen that one time. The drive ranges in capacity from 8GB to 64GB, and will be out in August for some exorbitant, as-yet-undisclosed cost. Check out a needlessly abusive video of the drive after the break. %Gallery-97432%
LaCie's Rugged Safe external HDD is rugged, safe
While LaCie has certainly created some fanciful product designs over the years, its product naming is often quite succinct. Take the Rugged series, the drop-proof external storage solution, which is now welcoming the Rugged Safe model into the family. This version adds a fingerprint scanner recessed into its armor-plated case, which encapsulates either 500GB or 1TB of storage that is now also cloaked in 128-bit AES encryption. Up to 10 registered users can be added, who can access files via USB or FireWire, but sadly neither USB 3.0 nor eSATA are on offer. Despite the limited connectivity you'll naturally be paying a more for the added security, with the 500GB model costing $189 and the 1TB version jumping to $299. Compare that to $119 and $159 for the biometric-free versions and you can see just how much that little fingerprint of yours can cost you. %Gallery-93714%
LaCie plays media server, NAS cards with Network Space MAX
No monkeys here, but LaCie's latest is still worth toying around with -- particularly if you've been yearning for a way to better serve media around your home and / or backup those all-important Match.com email confirmations. The Network Space MAX (which can also be used as a USB 2.0 drive when away from the CAT5) is predictably designed by Neil Poulton, and while it'll likely attract an unhealthy amount of dust and fingerprints, the internals are what really matters. LaCie's shipping these with at least 2TB of space, but with two 3.5-inch SATA HDD slots, you can easily go the 4TB route with a couple of these. RAID 1 and RAID 0 setups are supported, giving the whimsical among us a pair of opportunities to get our lives backed up in case of disaster. Oh, and there's also inbuilt UPnP / DLNA support, which makes it easy for your PS3, Xbox 360 or Popcorn Hour box to tap into whatever media collection you happen to store here. Check it sooner than you can whisk yourself around and belt out a Lady Gaga lyric for $279.99 and up. %Gallery-93305%
LaCie Rugged USB 3.0 external HDD to hit stores this May
The gang at LaCie sure do love their orange, life raft-esque external HDDs. As you've probably guessed, the Rugged USB 3.0 takes the already familiar device, which is designed to resist drops up to 2.2 meters, and throws SuperSpeed USB into the mix. The 500GB (7200 RPM) model becomes available in early May for $150. If anything, it looks like this company definitely got its money's worth out of Neil Poulton!
