drive

Go figure. We thought that legendary luxury goods purveyor S.T. Dupont would have better things to do than make an occasional computer peripheral. But apparently the palladium memory stick it introduced earlier this year wasn't just a one-time thing.

In between crafting museum-quality pens and lighters, the Parisian institution is continuing to forge USB keys such as those from its "Cote d'Azur" collection. The newest models are made of palladium and a choice of three lacquered colors, each bearing the company's signature diamond-head pattern.

We don't necessarily object to the company keeping up … Read more

Even with all the useless items Crave encounters routinely, this has got to be one of the sillier examples. Which is why we feel compelled to write about it, of course.

It's a USB lighter. That's right, a flash drive that you can also use to fire up a stogie (or whatever). The German-made "Memlite," as it's called, has a 512MB memory key that pops out of this unlikely combo gadget for those frequent times when you just have to store some digital data while getting a smoke. As Everything USB notes, it's unclear … Read more

How's this for the latest in PC designs? Drums. Yes, like the kind that you bang on, all day if you must, with or without sticks.

When fellow Craver Brian Cooley posted an item months ago about the Spotswood kick-drum computer, we assumed it was just something from one of the obscure sites he surfs, in between 007 blogs and single-malt scotch retailers. As it turns out, he may actually have been on the cutting edge of a new trend, the latest example being the "Shadow" hard drive from Suissa Computers.

Although it's not a full … Read more

Seagate Technology, the number one maker of magnetic hard drives, is going to make hard drives based around flash memory too, says CEO Bill Watkins.

"We are going to have a solid state drive, probably for enterprise first," he said during an interview on Wednesday. "We think we can make these drives better."

Seagate's decision is a significant turning point in the religious war in the storage market. The flash versus magnetic debate has been issue No. 1 in the storage world for the past two years. Magnetic hard drives have been a crucial component … Read more

One of the few disadvantages left to owning a laptop is having to stare longingly at your desktop-owning buddies while they fill up their massive 500GB hard drives with all sorts of (completely legally acquired) audio and video content.

While it's still not at the half-terabyte level, Toshiba and Samsung are both working on ever-larger laptop hard drives. Toshiba is taking the standard 2.5-inch drive up to 320GB, as well as working on a 200GB drive that runs at desktop-like speeds of 7,200rpm. Both of these should start showing up around November.

Samsung, on the other hand, … Read more

Time to stuff some more music onto your laptop.

Toshiba has expanded capacity of its 2.5-inch drives, pushing its 5400RPM drives to 320GB and its faster 7200RPM line to 200GB, the company said Tuesday. The company aims the products not just for notebook computers, but also for other portable and consumer electronics devices.

All the models feature 12-millisecond seek times; the 5400RPM models have 8MB buffers and the 7200RPM models have 16MB.

The Japanese company, which also employs engineers in Fremont, Calif., to design its drives, couldn't help but call out a rosy Gartner forecast for 2.5-inch … Read more

In advance of Labor Day weekend and its inevitable coast-to-coast traffic jams, Microsoft is releasing Streets & Trips 2008 software. Among the new features in the deluxe edition are live traffic updates, information on nearby gas prices, and estimates of what filling up along the journey will cost for that Hummer, Prius, or whatever else you're driving. It also hooks up to Live Search maps that you can mark up, and which chart businesses including hotels, snack spots and camping areas.

Despite such helpful features, this product seems like an odd fit in the market when you can get … Read more

Corsair is apparently the kind of company we can relate to: a paranoid one. Although it's made a name for itself in high-speed technologies, some of its recent products seem more focused on security and survival than anything else. (Witness the seemingly indestructible "Flash Survivor" USB key.)

The company continues that theme in its latest offering, the "Flash Padlock," which expands the secure USB concept with a numeric keypad that can be programmed to your own five-digit code. It locks automatically when disconnected, according to OhGizmo, an it won't even be acknowledged by the … Read more

This one we're not so sure about. Granted, some of the more elaborate game chairs and simulators featured in this space aren't for everyone, but we have a hard time justifying nearly $500 for what appears to be just a seat.

Tech Digest says the "Playseat Evolution" is a sponsor of the Dutch A1 racing team, made of steel oval-pipe framing and compatible with all the major game consoles and accessories. It's been released on the U.K. market and can reportedly withstand "even the most vigorous of gamers."

All that may be … Read more