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Hitachi introduces 2TB SimpleDrive for digital pack rats
Hitachi GST has been pushing 2TB hard drives for quite some time, but for whatever reason, the outfit's long-standing SimpleDrive line has been held back from enjoying the spoils. Until today, obviously. The outfit has just introduced a 2TB edition of its external SimpleDrive, and it also announced that all of its 3.5-inch retail drives are now available in 2TB capacities. There's also an upgraded Hitachi SimpleTech Pro Drive and Duo Pro Drive (2 x 2TB), with prices for the entire lot checking in at $249.99, $299.99 and $499.99 in order of mention. Oh, and in just case your 250GB drive from 2002 just hit its limit today, you'll be elated to know that each of these are available as we speak.
Hitachi intros two new portable HDDs, SimpleNET NAS adapter
If you'll recall, Hitachi GST snapped up Fabrik in February, and with that acquisition came the latter company's highly-regarded SimpleTech line. Today, Hitachi is introducing its first consumer products since the pickup, and while you'll notice a hint of 'Simple' in the titles, the branding is all Hitachi. First up is the water-resistant and shock-proof SimpleTOUGH portable USB drive (250/320/500GB for $99.99/$119.99/$149.99), which can survive a 3-meter fall and boasts a twistable USB cable that's permanently affixed to the enclosure. Next, there's the SimpleDRIVE Mini, which is a stylish, colorful portable HDD that is now shipping in red wine (250GB; $89.99), blue dusk (320GB; $109.99) and carbon fiber black (500GB; $139.99). Finally, there's Hitachi's alternative to the Pogoplug: the SimpleNET USB/NAS adapter. Put simply, this $79 device enables up to two USB HDDs to be placed on a network, though Hitachi makes clear that this is a convenience device, not a performance device. The 10/100 Ethernet jack is evidence of that, but hey, if you need a quick-and-dirty way to get your hard drive (regardless of format, by the way) on the web, this will certainly do it. Full release is after the break.
Hitachi acquires Fabrik, looks to expand market presence
We keep hearing that it's a buyer's market out there, and for anyone with any amount of cash (that'd be Hitachi, in this scenario), the getting is pretty great. Hitachi Global Storage Technologies (GST) has just announced that it has snapped up Fabrik, Inc., a privately-held supplier of personal and professional storage solutions. You may be more familiar with the said company's brands, as G-Technology and SimpleTech tend to ring bells much better than a name easily mistaken for clothing. According to Steve Milligan, President of Hitachi GST, the acquisition will soon become "the cornerstone for the next phase of Hitachi's business transformation," though he certainly didn't bother to elaborate. Who knows -- maybe one day soon we really will see Hitachi taking on the likes of Western Digital and LaCie in the external sector.
SimpleTech trots out 3TB Duo Pro / 1.5TB Pro external HDDs
Fabrik's SimpleTech brand initially pushed out its Pro external drives and online backup service around this time last year, but thankfully it finally figured out what we consumers want: that it keep up with the capacity curve. The firm's Duo Pro drive, which boasts four interfaces (eSATA, FireWire 400 / 800 and USB 2.0), will be available in Q4 with 3TB of room. As for its smaller sibling, you can expect the single-drive 1.5TB Pro model to land around the same time for a definitively different unknown price. %Gallery-32840%
SimpleTech hops on eco-friendly bandwagon with [re]drive HDD
Not that we haven't seen bamboo-based gizmos before, but there's something about SimpleTech's [re]drive that just screams upscale. This elegant, smooth looking external HDD was crafted to be easy on the eyes and Mother Earth alike, with the outfit utilizing "renewable, naturally grown bamboo and recyclable aluminum" along with an Energy Star power adapter and eco-friendly packaging. You'll also find a USB 2.0 jack, automatic power up / down and 500GB of internal storage space. Not too shabby for an estimated $150.[Via Wired]
Fabrik intros colorful new SimpleTech Signature Mini USB drives
Those looking for something that'll stand out a little more than your run-of-the-mill external hard drive now have a slew of new options to consider from Fabrik, which has once again teamed with Italian design firm Pininfarina on some of its SimpleTech-branded drives. Dubbed the Signature Mini, the drives are available in your choice of seven different colors and 120GB, 160GB, 250GB or 320GB capacities, although each color is not available in each size. Taking things one step further, each drive comes with 2GB of free online backup space, and optional unlimited online backup for $5 a month, each options of which employ 448-bit Blowfish encrypted servers to keep your data safe. Look for the whole lot to be available sometime next month for between $110 and $230, although Mac users will have to wait until later in Q1 in order to take advantage of the online backup options.
Fabrik launches SimpleTech Pro drives, online backup service
Fabrik hit us up with a double dose of news today, so we'll get right to it. First up is the firm's new line of SimpleTech Pro / Duo Pro Drives ($229.99 to $799.99), which are aimed at digital media enthusiasts, prosumers and business users and come equipped with up to 2TB of storage space, eSATA and USB 2.0 connections. Next we're looking at the outfit's Ultimate Backup, which is hailed as "a simple, affordable and secure way to protect your most coveted content both offsite and online." For under five bucks a month, the service provides users with "unlimited capacity to securely store important files and media collections remotely and automatically," and moreover, all files are "encrypted with 128-bit SSL encryption while in transit, with an option for a private encryption key, to the company's remote 448-bit Blowfish encrypted servers (in other words, it's secure)." For more details, be sure and give the read links below a gander.Read - SimpleTech drivesRead - Ultimate Backup service
SimpleTech announces 512GB and 256GB 3.5-inch SSD drives
You know how it is, five minutes ago we were not aware of our dire need for 512GB of ridiculously fast NAND storage, but it's all so clear now: there can be no substitute. SimpleTech has announced the Zeus-IOPS SSD 512GB and 256GB SSD drives, which offer up the largest flash drive capacities we're aware of in a 3.5-inch enclosure. Performance ain't no slouch either, with SimpleTech claiming 200x performance over 15,000 RPM enterprise hard drives, with better reliability to boot. SimpleTech wouldn't come clean on an exact price, but it expects prices for SSD to drop to $2 per GB by 2012, meaning that in five years you can get one of these 512 giggers for the low, low price of $1,000 -- and we're guessing around ten times that when the drive launches in Q3 2007. The 256GB is available now.[Thanks, Kelly]
SimpleTech SimpleDrive: up to 1TB, Pininfarina design
We don't often wind-tunnel test our external drive enclosures, but SimpleTech's re-released Pininfarina-designed SimpleDrive still kind of makes us want to break down to try. Now in capacities up to 1TB, the 7200rpm USB 2.0 drives come bundled with backup software, a 2GB Fabrik account (which might have had something to do with Fabrik acquiring SimpleTech's peripheral business), that inline light-up capacity meter, and your choice of colors based on capacity: red (160GB), white (250GB), sapphire (320GB), onyx (500GB) and gray (750GB and 1TB). Prices start at a hundred bones for the 160GB unit; combo FireWire 400 and USB versions will ship in May.%Gallery-2489%
SimpleTech announces "world's thinnest" 2.5-inch 64GB SSD
World's thinnest titles aren't just for cellphones and DAPs, don't you know, Solid State Drives need to shave those millimeters just as much as the next guy, and SimpleTech seems up to the task with its new 64 gigger. The 2.5-inch drive, a member of SimpleTech's Zeus SSD lineup, measures a mere 9.5mm thick (0.37-inches), compared to some competing solutions more than twice as thick, making it a solid option for squeezing into those ever-slimmer laptops. SimpleTech is currently targeting the device at high performance applications such as military, intelligence and aviation, and has apparently buffeted the drive against shock, humidity, vibration and altitude -- most of the stability naturally thanks to the flash technology, of course. No word price, but with those kind of customers, we're guessing this one won't be cheap.
SimpleTech external HDDs designed by Pininfarina
We've never really felt the specific urge to have the plastic casing that houses our data be designed by a company like Pininfarina -- the same people who designed cars such as the Ferrari 575M Maranello, Jaguar XJ-S and Volvo C70. If, however, such design standards strike your fancy, SimpleTech is offering up some portable USB 2.0 drives that could do the trick. They range from the $110 40GB version to the $180 100GB version, and all spin their disks at 5400RPM with 8MB of cache.[Via The Gadget Weblog]
