Iomega launch new portable and eSata Pro Hard Drives

Iomega Corporation today introduced two exciting new choices in portable and desktop storage: the stylish Iomega® eGo™ USB 2.0 Portable Hard Drive and the speedy Iomega® eSATA/USB 2.0 Professional Hard Drive.

Iomega’s Latest Portable Hard Drive
The Iomega® eGo™ Portable Hard Drive USB 2.0 is a fast and fun notebook hard drive that delivers on form and function. Iomega’s new eGo Drive has an elegantly curved chassis with the choice of two colors – cherry-red or burnished gray – and chrome endcaps that sets it apart from other portable hard drives. With the new eGo Drive, Iomega introduces flair and panache to the HDD market, something rarely seen in any competitor’s product. The eGo Drive also packs a lot of storage capability – the 160GB* 2.5-inch drive is USB-powered for simple operation (no power supply required), and it comes with EMC® Retrospect® HD software for automatic backups, scheduled backups, or on-demand backups. DropGuard™ technology protects the drive from accidental damage caused by drops of up to 51 inches so users can carry up to 640,000 photos, over 2,900 hours of music or 240 hours of video** with confidence.

“The Iomega eGo Portable Hard Drive calls attention to itself with its beautiful red contoured case, while its automatic backup software works transparently to protect your digital life,” said Peter Wharton, Vice President, Marketing, Iomega Corporation. “The eGo Drive gives users a high capacity portable hard drive as well as a fashion statement that says they’re different than all the rest.”

Iomega’s Latest eSATA External Hard Drive
Also announced today is the Iomega® eSATA/USB 2.0 Professional Hard Drive, a slender silver hard drive that uses the new 3 Gbit/second eSATA interface for the fastest possible access to its 500GB storage capacity. Its high performance makes it a perfect match for the demands of advanced graphics software, video editing applications, and small server or network environments. This Iomega eSATA Professional Hard Drive also comes with award-winning EMC Retrospect Express software for automatic backups, scheduled backups, or on-demand backups, as well as other advanced features. For computers that do not have an eSATA interface (PCI eSATA cards are available separately), the USB 2.0 interface offers a universally popular alternative.

“Iomega’s new 500GB eSATA Professional Hard Drive combines blazing speed with high capacity and an industrial design that’s rugged and futuristic,” said Wharton. “In today’s data-intensive world, both of Iomega’s new external hard drives dispense with boring design and give users an eye-catching excuse to focus on safeguarding their digital files.”

Compatibility
Both drives are compatible with Microsoft® Windows 2000 Professional, Windows XP Home/XP Professional/XP Professional x64, and Windows Vista™. The eGo Portable Hard Drive is compatible with Mac OS X 10.1.5 or above; the Professional Hard Drive eSATA is compatible with Mac OS X 10.2 or above.

The eSATA/USB 2.0 Professional Hard Drive requires a system with an eSATA interface for operation as an eSATA drive (PCI eSATA card not included).

Price and Availability
The Iomega® 160GB eGo™ Portable Hard Drive USB 2.0 is now available for 139.00 Euro VAT included. The Iomega® eSATA/USB 2.0 500GB Professional Hard Drive is also now available for 179.00 Euro VAT included. Both products are available from online retailers, VARs, resellers and select retailers, as well as at www.iomega.com.

MetroLite - nice carriage for your laptop !

Brenthaven has launched its MetroLite range, a selection of laptop shoulder bags perfect for the professional market. Now 17% lighter, the MetroLite range are sleek, lightweight cases with a patent-pending CORE Protection System that protects the screen from impact throughout. At just £49.95 it comes in green and black and fits laptops from 12-inches to 15.4-inches.

The MetroLite range is a protective yet extra light solution for anyone who travels with their computer, it has improved handles and ergonomic padded shoulder strap to balance weight comfortably. It includes a front organiser pocket, which is a perfect fit for your iPod, PDA or mobile phone. Brenthaven has included an innovative grommet and storage pocket for headphones or a mobile phone headset plus an AC Adaptor pocket with easy access. A back slip pocket is built in for all your loose paperwork or newspapers. The MetroLite range even incorporates a soft faux-suede lining.

Lacie Launch 2TB Ethernet Big Disk

Lacie have made a new larger capacity Ethernet Big Disk available for purchase. In its new 2TB, yes, you read that right 2 terrabyte form, the drive is in stock at £669. Having been a long time Mac user, I have always liked Lacie products for their superb build quality, so this new drive is well worth a look. It offers Gigabit ethernet, and full support for Windows, Linux and Mac platforms. Of note for Mac users, AFP and Bonjour is supported, plus you get a USB2 port for extending the capacity further, or photo sharing with compatible digital cameras. I must admit, I want one.

Sling adds Apple TV to SlingPlayer

Sling Media today launched a new version of SlingPlayer for Mac, which amongst other things, adds support to control Apple-specific devices. SlingPlayer can now control the Apple TV and play its content from any broadband connection, meaning you can now remotely control and listen to your iTunes library. This is great news and shows that Sling definitely wants to support and improve functionality for Mac users.

iSkin launch new laptop sleeves

iSkin has launched SOHO, their new laptop protective sleeves for 15-inch MacBook Pros, and the MacBook. They are made of synthetic leather, have a slim two two design, with contrasting stitching, and have a reinforced outer shell. There are also inner elastic straps to help keep your laptop in place, and allows use of the laptop whilst still inside the SOHO.

The MacBook model costs $59.99 and $64.99 will buy you the MacBook Pro version.

Miglia TVMini Express - Bargain Digital TV

Today, Miglia Technology announced the launch of TVMini Express for a bargain price of just £39.95. The latest addition to the Miglia TV range this small USB device transforms your Mac into a completely portable digital TV tuner and puts your recorded files directly onto your iPod.

TVMini Express features Miglia’s new software which works in harmony with Miglia’s award winning hardware. TVMini Express is perfect for watching and recording TV and exporting to iPod. TVMini Express’s integrated digital TV tuner lets you enjoy a wide range of TV channels at home or whilst travelling. Full Freeview and TNT support makes the product a great choice for students and business travellers alike.

Key Features

  • Watch and record all your favourite shows in superb digital quality
  • Great performance, crystal clear digital picture quality and perfect sound
  • Share shows with your iPod or iPhone for great TV on the go
  • Real-time display of what is playing on each TV channel
  • Two year warranty for total peace of mind

AppleTV now shipping in UK

Today, Apple announced they are now shipping Apple TV™, an easy to use and fun way to wirelessly play all your favourite iTunes® content from your PC or Mac® on your widescreen TV, including movies, TV shows, music, photos and podcasts. With Apple TV’s stunning new interface, anyone can quickly browse and view their entire collection of digital media from across the room using the simple and intuitive Apple Remote. Apple TV easily connects to almost all modern widescreen televisions.

“Apple TV is like a DVD player for the Internet age—providing an easy and fun way to play all your favourite iTunes content from your PC or Mac on your widescreen TV,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. “Apple TV allows you to wirelessly play your content from your PCs or Macs using your existing WiFi network as well as the newest and fastest version of WiFi—802.11n.”

The seamless integration of Apple TV and iTunes lets users choose from over 400 movies and 350 TV shows in near DVD quality; over four million songs; 5,000 music videos; 100,000 podcasts; and 20,000 audiobooks from the iTunes Store (www.itunes.com/uk). Users can also watch their favourite movie trailers right on their widescreen TV, listen to their favourite music on their home entertainment system, and view slideshows of their photo albums in high definition resolution. Apple TV makes it easy for users to explore their entire media collection with an easy to use and intuitive new interface. With the Apple Remote, consumers can easily browse through their favourite movies, TV shows, music and photos from up to 30 feet away.

Apple TV has a 40GB hard drive to store up to 50 hours of video, 9,000 songs, 25,000 photos or a combination of each and is capable of delivering high-definition 720p output.* Apple TV is easy to connect to a broad range of widescreen TVs and home theatre systems and comes standard with HDMI, component video, analogue and optical audio ports. Using high-speed AirPort® 802.11** wireless networking, Apple TV can auto-sync content from one computer or stream content from up to five additional computers right to your TV without any wires.***

Apple TV, which includes an Apple Remote, will be available beginning this week from the Apple Store® (www.apple.com/uk), Apple’s retail stores and Apple Authorised Resellers for a suggested retail price of £199 (inc. VAT). Apple retail stores will also offer hands on workshops and demonstrations of Apple TV’s features. It requires iTunes 7.1 or later running on a Mac with Mac OS® X version 10.3.9 or later, or a Windows PC with Windows XP Home/Professional (SP2).

Miglia TVMax+ with digital tuner

Today, Miglia Technology, announced TVMax+. A content collection hub, for use with iPod, AppleTV and Apple computers. TVMax+ allows you to view your favourite shows on every screen in your home, from your living room to your iPod to your Mac. TVMax+ also doubles as a digital TV tuner, so you can watch, pause and record TV shows to watch exactly as you want choose.

We have reviewed the first generation TVMax on Geekanoids, well this takes things one step further, adding a digital tuner, which can't be a bad thing.

“In tests TVMax was used to capture a short 30 minute clip of our favourite TV show and was set to put that clip onto an iPod Video, the whole process took 31.5 minutes and we were watching the finished result (at 640x480). The same clip captured using an alternative software capture solution took 61 minutes from start to finish before we could view the show on our iPod, that’s almost 100% faster using TVMax.”

Epson Stylus Pro 3800 Review - coming soon

Epson printers just keep getting better and better. I have been a long time fan of Epson's offerings, and have previously reviewed many of their scanners and printers. Well, now it is time for the big boys, with the Epson Stylus Pro 3800 that they have kindly agreed to send down to us.

The Stylus Pro 3800 is an A2+ (17”) cut sheet desktop wide format printer, the latest addition to the Epson Professional printer range to incorporate the well proven and respected UltraChrome K3 inkset. The K3 inks are very highly regarded in the industry, with many galleries only accpeting prints using these inks. We will be testing a wide range of media finishes, as well as checking just how good the prints look against conventional photos, and the original scanned files. As well as throwing some digital files at the 3800, taken with the latest Canon SLR technology. Check back soon to read the full review.

Maxtor Fusion & MyBook World Edition - a mini HD server !

I love technology ! This is a bit of an understatement really, as why else would I run Geekanoids, bringing all this tech goodness day in, day out. Well, my latest trend, in my office, is that I love storage. Just recently I was embarrassed to learn that I had accumulated six external hard drives. A bit of re-organising and I gave a few away to the needy and I now have a much more manageable system. What does interest me is network storage (NAS). Currently I have a NAS hard drive, which sits hidden away and anything I need to take off my MacBook, to free up some room, gets transferred to the NAS. This solution is OK, but I am sure that I do not use my NAS to its full potential.

What excited me this week was the possibility of taking things one step further. I stumbled upon the Maxtor Fusion, which is a 500GB affair with a difference. Not only does it allow you to store files locally via a USB2 connection, but it also has an ethernet port, so it can become part of your local network. If you want even more flexibility, you can access your files from anywhere over the internet. You can even set up folders and send out specific email attachments to friends and colleagues, giving them access to files. Western Digital offer something similar called the My Book World Edition I & II. The latter does not mention Mac compatibility, though I am sure it would work fine.

I am determined to bring you details of how these two drives work, so will hopefully be able to get hold of review units soon and give you the lowdown.