Everything USB - Gadgets, Wireless USB, USB 3.0

Samsung 1.8" Drive Reaches 250GB, Goes Native USB

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 12:19:40 -0500

Samsung S2 recently becomes the first native USB hard drive. The decision to drop SATA or PATA altogether from the drive is about cutting cost associated with a USB bridge controller, improving speed by eliminating interrupt service time, and reducing physical size, which also has to do with that same component. By taking out the USB-to-SATA board, Samsung can easily win contest for having the smallest mobile drive.

As another breakthrough, Samsung now debuts Spinpoint N3U 250GB 1.8" drive that comprises of two 125GB platters. The native USB controller stays, resulting in less power usage, smaller footprint and optimized speed. The disk's rotation speed is clocked at 3,600 rpm, compared to 120GB/160GB's 4,200 rpm. Though, it's uncertain whether how this will impact performance and how the 8MB cache can make up for the slower spinning rate. Expect the N3U 250GB to ship to OEMs in July with a MSRP of $199. We may initially see Samsung offering the new N3U in its S1 mini series as well.
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USB Flash Drives Become The Next VCR Tapes?

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 10:31:39 -0500

UK's Digital Vision is going after a particular market with their new flash drive-based DVR. The GiGo DV-DTR1 DVB-T recorder has plentiful USB ports (three to be exact), which are all located in front of the chassis for easy access.

When all jacks are occupied, different family members can choose where to record the content into. Scheduled recordings from EPG can go into three separate USB storage, whether it be an external hard drive or a regular thumbdrive. This should come in handy since you can eject flash drive and take away the Freeview content without interrupting what other people are watching. At the same time, this can save you precious time of copying the show from the internal DVR's hard drive, which in this case is ditched by the company to reduce cost. Digital Vision is likely targeting at the less-tech savvy who would rather go back to putting sticky labels on their flash drives than managing long list of files in a terabyte hard drive.
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LaCie LaCinema Rugged HD - All-terrain 1080p H.264 Playback

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 07:02:41 -0500

Our chief complaint with LaCie LaCinema Rugged is the lack of H.264 codec and especially MKV container compatibility. When you are targeting a portable media center market, skipping those features will almost guarantee failure. Other than that, the Rugged by Neil Poulton is pretty slick overall. This is why we should give it a second chance with the release of LaCinema Rugged HD.

The updated version sports the same scratch-resistant aluminum design as its "SD" sibling except with the addition of popular HD video codec and audio format support. The LaCinema Rugged HD, like its unsuccessful predecessor, can now playback H.264, VC-1 and WMV9. Container support has been expanded to MKV, TRP and M2TS. Audio support now includes OGG, PCM and AC3. Feature-wise, it's fair to say that WDTV media player has finally met its match. Then again, after checking LaCie product page on the Rugged, the $349.99 price tag for the 500GB model may deter buyers.
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Buffalo USB Ethernet Hub - Perfect for Offsite LAN Parties

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 04:26:12 -0500

Should you and your LAN party buddies need to travel light, this mobile Ethernet hub from Buffalo is undoubtedly the most effortless way to connect notebooks or desktops together in a hotel room or at a camp site. This 2280-yen ($24) accessory is powered by none other than USB which makes the network device very traveler-friendly as there's no need bulky AC adapter to lug around.

The only caveat is that the max. speed you get is 100Mbps, so it isn't the optimal connection for sharing multi-gigabyte HD content. And of course, if there are more people joining, the Buffalo USB Ethernet hub is inherently limited by the three RJ45 jacks on-board.
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Yoostar Lets You Live Your Hollywood Dream

Tue, 07 Jul 2009 12:30:43 -0500

What's Yoostar? In a nutshell, it lets you live your hollywood dream, in front of your PC. Yoostar is a kit comprising of a special USB webcam, a portable greenscreen and software that can insert your image into your favorite movies. From the video demo, we could see the host replacing Glover from Sesame Street, and then he tried follow the original conversations with Elmo.

You'll get 14 classic scenes each of which is between 1 and 2 minutes long when Yoostar hits retail next month. The company has already secured rights to content from Paramount, Universal, MGM, Liongate and Warner Brothers. Don't expect user-contributed scenes as they are a copyright no-no. Before Yoostar can upload new movie scenes, this could get old fast, but in the long run, social community will be created where other users can upload their clips, comment on them, share tips, and possibly compete in talent contests. Due to copyright restrictions, Yoostart ($169) will only be available in the States initially although plans to roll out this internationally is well underway. Video demo after the jump.
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USB Chainsaw - Parody or The Perfect Cubicle Weapon?

Tue, 07 Jul 2009 10:07:53 -0500

We never saw this coming. If this isn't some 2010 April Fool's joke leaked too early, the i.Saw Chainsaw possibly opens a whole new category of USB ~~weaponry~~ tools. The i.Saw is reportedly no larger than the size of a regular keyboard, and it is built with touch plastic and lightweight alloy to reduce the weight for the chainsaw for office use(?).

The company almost has everything listed on their website from dimensions to weight, guide bar length and different safety features. The only and most important thing left to answer is how they figured out feeding enough juice from a 5W USB 2.0 port to move those sharp chains at a speed that can cut through different woods. Unfortunately, the folks behind i.Saw hid their website's WHOIS record so we couldn't check if the same group of people has previously tried to pull hoax on the blog community. The device is listed for merely $59.95. You could sign up for pre-order, and wait to see if the i.Saw USB chainsaw will actually materialize in September - the estimated shipping month.
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Interview with Head of Nexcopy on USB Duplicators

Mon, 06 Jul 2009 20:14:24 -0500

Recently, Everything USB had a chance to sit down with Greg Morris, President & CEO of Nexcopy to chat about their latest flash memory duplicators. Nexcopy is readying their new 40- and 60-port USB duplicators, and we thought it a good idea to get some additional information. In the Skype interview, Greg discussed with us the scalability and strength of their thumbdrive duplicators, and he also offered insights into this mass niche market. Full transcript after the jump.
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SanDisk Ultra Backup Flash Drive Review

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 05:50:47 -0500

According to Acronis' 2009 survey of over 6,000 households, roughly 64% of users perform data backups only once every 2-3 months if at all. Ouch! Now that USB flash drive capacities are growing over 64GB, SanDisk is looking to spur good backup practices by having users ditch bulky external hard drives for their smaller, aptly-named Ultra Backup flash drives. Powered by U3 and bundled with Dmailer's intuitive backup software, is the first thumb drive to feature a Backup button worth it? More importantly, will you finally be coerced into backing up on a regular basis? Press on to our in-depth review to find out!
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Thanko's Best Pinhole Spycam Yet

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 11:42:29 -0500

The folks behind Thanko likely do a lot of spying from what we can tell from these so-called gadgets such as tie camera, watch camera and underwater cam. They now come up with hiding a pinhole camera behind a shirt button. This is by far the best device from Thanko will let you carry out covert surveillance without risking exposing yourself. In comparison, the tie is just silly and the the watch is just somewhat inconvenient in use.

Thanko's Spy Button Camera carries 4GB with a mini-USB receptacle, and has the ability to shoot video at VGA at 15fps or to snap pics at 1280 x 1024. The integrated battery can last up to three and a half hours. Here's the best part: the Thanko comes with a ring to wirelessly remote control power, video recording and still shot capture. Between all the other so-called spycams, this one is worth dropping 6600 yen ($68 USD).
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Seagate BlackArmor PS 110 Drive Let you 'Try & Decide'

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 11:12:12 -0500

Maxtor BlackArmor that made its debut at the beginning of 2008 is a full disk encryption external drive. When the product series was handed over to Seagate, it receives massive software overhual, but shares the same chassis with FreeAgent Go, measuring just 5" x 3" x 0.5". The BlackArmor PS 110 USB 2.0 drive is now in black, lending a more professional image than its colorful sibling.

In addition to full-system & file-based backup via scheduled or manual backup method for PCs, Seagate includes a very interesting "Try and Decide" feature that allows you to download and install new software titles or open email attachments in a protected partition so you can roll back the changes. Say, if you are installing some freeware and encounter a virus or malware, it's as easy as hitting "stop" and let Seagate software to revert to the last known condition after a restart. This alone is pretty unique, but it doesn't seem like the BlackArmor PS 110 is hardware encrypted even though the software does 256-bit AES security. Performance isn't too shabby, topping at 30MB/s read and 25MB/s write. Last but not least the BlackArmor is backed by a generous 5-year warranty.
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Cigar Flash Drive with Glowing LED at Tip

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 10:02:18 -0500

Here's a little DIY project for your Independence Day weekend. Instructables has provided a very detailed instructions on how to turn a perfect good cigar into a flash drive with glowing LED. The materials needed include a thick cigar; a very small thumbdrive; a pair of red LEDs; a 10k resistor; wood primer; tape; and some very thin paper. For tools, you need cutter, drills, X-Acto knives set, soldering iron, desolder kit, and hot melt gun as well as glue.

In a nutshell, procedures are to bore out the cigar, prime the internal leaves, gut the flashd rive, connect to the LED, insert flash drive components into the cigar body, and lastly glue the ends. The guy started this obviously has too much time on his hand. Personally, we would rather watch the July 4th parade.
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Best of June 2009 - Everything USB

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 09:03:08 -0500

Featured Reviews

USB News

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Funko Competes with Mimoco for Star Wars Flash Drive Market

Tue, 30 Jun 2009 19:33:13 -0500

The time has come to dethrone Mimoco as the de facto manufacturer of Star Wars flash drive figurines. Funko is ready to jump into the arena as a formidable contender with 2GB flash drives based on four iconic Star Wars characters: Yoda, Darth Yader, Stormtrooper and Boba Fett. Their USB connector is revealed by pulling out their head which doubles as a cap.

In comparison, Funko has paid more attention on the details and its drives are more faithful to the original characters while Mimoco designed Mimobots, whose shapes are almost identical with each other, to work better as a flash drive than the Funko's and there's also pre-loaded content and more capacity choices. Funko will ship all four models in October at a price of $24.99 apiece.
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Vacuum Tube-lookalike USB Sound Card (Creativity: +1)

Tue, 30 Jun 2009 12:53:35 -0500

The sheer number of choices for USB sound cards tells us there's not much room for innovations, but someone manages to teach the old dog new tricks. Rather than a dongle form factor, the USB Tube Delight Audio is a vacuum tube-lookalike whose LED glows in blue when plugged in. 3.5 mm headphone jack and mic-in are elegantly placed opposite to the mini-USB receptacle, and the mic-in can be disabled to switch to line-in via software.

Granted, this isn't exactly designed for portability and the fade-in and fade-out effect is also a minor annoyance when watching movies. The "sound tube" deserves credit for bringing us a small surprise. Like many USB gadgets, the USB Tube Delight Audio is sold exclusively at Brando for $32.
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Apple Backs Micro USB... Sorta

Tue, 30 Jun 2009 12:04:52 -0500

Even after Open Mobile Terminal Platform and GSM Association had agreed to switch to micro USB as standard connector for smartphones, Apple still didn't bow, and insisted on milking its iPod dock connector. Now top mobile phone suppliers have agreed with European Union to standardize micro-USB on smartphones, and hope to achieve this by 2012.

EU said this the move is strictly voluntary, but since Nokia, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, RIM and LG have pledged support and they together command over 90% of market share, the rest will likely follow suit due to peer pressure. Interestingly, the defiant Apple now also makes the switch, in its own way. The fruit company has confirmed while it intends to support micro-USB connection, Apple will likely provide a dock adapter to meet the compatibility goal. So we won't be kissing Apple's dock connector goodbye in the next iPhone 3G 'whatever'.
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Asus' Slim & Sleek Blu-ray USB Drive with Glowing Big 'X'

Sun, 28 Jun 2009 20:31:01 -0500

Having a big screen laptop without Blu-ray is kinda like missing an opportunity to cruise down an empty highway. Granted, you can download HD content, but if you are geeks like us, there's an urge to fully leverage the full potential of the notebook. For whatever reasons you are getting Blu-ray, the USB-powered Asus' slim & sleek drive has you covered. It has upped the max. read speed to 4.8x for BD-ROM/RE which should relieve the agonizingly slow Blu-ray disc loading time. This however doesn't help with writing Blu-ray as the Asus SBC-04D1S-U is only a BD reader, a tray-loading one.

What we also like about the BD reader is the big glowing 'X' on the side, making it far more aesthetically pleasing than the FastMac. A copy of CyberLink is bundled for movie playback. Keep in mind you can only output the HD content given both the laptop and the LCD screen have either HDMI or DVI (HDCP).
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Windows 7 to Ship on Flash Drives?

Fri, 26 Jun 2009 12:33:11 -0500

There's a rumor circulating in the blogsphere that MS is planning to offer Windows 7 on a flash drive which would make it third way to get the OS without buying a new PC. The other two are through download & retail DVD. While the decision is still being made, this move is being considered in the first place to appeal to the ever growing netbook crowd whose under-powered machines usually lack any optical media drive.

Having said that, thumbdrives logically become the easiest, not to mention fastest route to get Windows 7 running on a netbook. In fact, they have already become the unofficial install method for XP, Vista and now 7 if you are comfortable with command prompt. If tweakers can teach newbies to do it in 10 minutes, it should be dead easy for MS to get a Windows 7 thumbdrive package ready.
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Razer Megalodon Headset Finally Ships... (A Good 10-Month Wait)

Fri, 26 Jun 2009 11:35:59 -0500

Razer's much anticipated USB gaming headset Megalodon - named after a prehistoric shark - will begin shipping on June 30th at 10am; that's approximately 10 months after the product was first announced last year, and that maybe how long it may take to excavate the real Megalodon (if complete fossils were to be found). We aren't certain why Razer waited this long, perhaps to wait out for the economy to recover.

What separates the Megalodon from the rest of the pack is its ability to virtualize 7.1 channels, and its Maelstrom audio processor to make simulated surround more believable. There's the remote control, which combines the Megalodon's on-audio processor with volume controls, a noise gate, and a mute button. The same pod also allows switching between 2.0 stereo and 7.1 surround mode for applications that don't need the extra directional sound. The direct competitor to the $149.99 Razer Megalodon is obviously the Logitech G35 headset which relies on Dolby Headphone 2.0 to create the tricks and is equally expensive ($120 street).
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RCA's $90 Small Wonder EZ209HD Camcorder

Fri, 26 Jun 2009 10:54:35 -0500

RCA Small Wonder EZ300HD 720p camcorder is a nice try, but it just isn't as aesthetically pleasing as all the other ones, and that seems to be a problem for all the company's gadgets, which appear to be designed by someone from the 1980s.

Not repeating the same mistake, the new Small Wonder EZ209HD is really slim and sleek - measuring roughly a half of an inch thick. The LCD display is downsized to 2" due to the camcorder's new form factor. 256MB internal memory gives you a head start, and if you need to capture everything into 720p, Micro SD slot is at your disposal. With a 16GB card, the EZ209HD can record up to 8 hours of HD content in YouTube-friendly H.264 format or 40 hours in web quality. You can jump between modes with the flick of a switch. This Small Wonder also has a dedicated photo shutter button for up to 8MP still picture capture. Internal battery isn't USB rechargeable; instead it has another charging adapter. Last but not least is the HDMI interface. MSRP is $120, but there is discount everywhere that brings the price to around $90.
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Thanko Extreme USB Laptop Cooler / Riser Combo

Fri, 26 Jun 2009 06:44:00 -0500

As convenient and versatile as laptops are, they aren't far from perfect, especially in the ergonomic department. Back pain, stiff necks, sore shoulders and alike are often bad side effects associated with prolonged laptop usage. This nifty Thanko articulating laptop riser (a.k.a. Easy Desk Cool 2) with fans should be just what you need to eliminate those problems.

You could refer this ergonomic gadget as a desk, which comes with three joints and folding legs so you can adjust the viewing angle of the notebook to the most comfortable position whether you are lying flat or sitting upright. When not in use, you can fold the legs together, and store it anywhere. A pair of built-in USB fans and the aluminum desktop surface work together in active and passive cooling method respectively to dissipate heat better from a notebook. If the $92 Thanko is a little overkill for you, you can check out these coolers from Antec, Belkin and Logitech.
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