Crave

The new Momentus Thin laptop hard drive.

(Credit: Seagate)

At only 9.5mm, the regular 2.5-inch laptop hard drive is already very thin compared with the 25.4mm of the 3.5-inch desktop hard drive. But Seagate, one of the bigger hard-drive makers around, just decided to go even slimmer.

The company announced Monday the Momentus Thin, a new 2.5-inch-based laptop hard drive that's 25 percent thinner, at only 7mm. This reduction in thickness makes the new hard drive comparable, in physical size, to that of most solid state drives (SSDs) used in Netbooks and ultraportable computers. However, it retains the advantages of regular hard drives, which include much higher capacities and, most importantly, a much lower cost per gigabyte.

The Momentus Thin offers the same performance as a regular SATA 2.5-inch hard drive, which is faster than most low-end SSD used in Netbooks. The new drive comes in two capacities (250GB and 160GB); sports 8MB of cache memory, supports a SATA 3Gbps interface, and spins at 5400rpm.

The Mometus Thin uses the same type of cable and ports as a regular SATA 2.5-inch hard drive. This means it will also fit in any application where a 9.5mm hard drive is used. This makes it possible for users to upgrade their existing storage by themselves.

The new Momentus Thin 2.5-inch SATA hard drives will be available in January, with the 250GB version costing only $55. It's unclear how much the 160GB version will cost, but it will obviously be cheaper than its larger counterpart.

Another Monday and another hot holiday giveaway here on Crave. We've given away Sony, LG, and Vizio 32-inch TVs, and now we have a Samsung 32-incher, the LN32B360.

Editor David Katzmaier reviewed this set and says that although it isn't as feature-heavy as some models in its class, "Samsung's LNB360 series takes the picture quality cake among entry-level LCDs." (Read the full review).

Special thanks to Shopper.com, which powers CNET's price-comparison engine and is a great site for finding the best prices on products. (See all of Shopper's deals, coupon codes, and rebates).

Normally, the Samsung LN32B360 would cost you about $500, but you have the chance to get it gratis.

So, how do you try to win this Samsung 32-inch LCD TV? Let me enumerate the basic rules. Please read them carefully; there will be a test.

• Register as a CNET user. Go to the top of this page and hit the "Join CNET" link to start the registration process. If you're already registered, there's no need to register again.
• Leave a comment below. You can leave whatever comment you want. If it's funny or insightful it won't help you win, but we're trying to have fun here, so anything entertaining is appreciated.
• Leave only one comment. You may enter this specific giveaway only once. If you enter more than one comment, you will be automatically disqualified.
• The winner will be chosen randomly. The winner will receive (1) Samsung LN32B360 32-inch LCD TV. Retail value is $500.
• If you are chosen, you will be notified via e-mail. Winners must respond within three days of the end of the contest. If you do not respond within that period, another winner will be chosen.
• Entries can be submitted until Tuesday, December 8, at 6:59:59 a.m. EST.

NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. MUST BE LEGAL RESIDENT OF ONE OF THE 50 UNITED STATES OR D.C., 18 YEARS OF AGE OR OLDER AT DATE OF ENTRY INTO SWEEPSTAKES. VOID IN PUERTO RICO, ALL U.S. TERRITORIES AND POSSESSIONS AND WHERE PROHIBITED BY LAW. Sweepstakes ends at 7 AM ET on December 8, 2009. See official rules for details.

Good luck.

Come back tomorrow for our next holiday giveaway. Tomorrow's prize will be a set of Targus Crave laptop bags.

A couple of days ago we gave away a Sony Bravia 32-inch LCD TV. For all of you who didn't win, don't despair. Now we're serving up an LG 32-inch LCD TV, which is just as good. It may be an entry-level model, but our video guru David Katzmaier had some nice things to say about it in his review.

"While its light shade of black won't win over bargain home theater sticklers, the LG H20 series' features and adjustability stand out among the entry-level crowd," he said.

Normally, the LG 32LH20 would cost you about $499, but you have the chance to get it gratis.

So, how do you try to win this 32-inch LCD TV? Let me enumerate the basic rules. Please read them carefully; there will be a test.

• Register as a CNET user. Go to the top of this page and hit the "Join CNET" link to start the registration process. If you're already registered, there's no need to register again.
• Leave a comment below. You can leave whatever comment you want. If it's funny or insightful it won't help you win, but we're trying to have fun here, so anything entertaining is appreciated.
• Leave only one comment. You may enter this specific giveaway only once. If you enter more than one comment, you will be automatically disqualified.
• The winner will be chosen randomly. The winner will receive (1) LG 32LH20 32-inch LCD TV. Approximate retail value is $499.
• If you are chosen, you will be notified via e-mail. Winners must respond within three days of the end of the contest. If you do not respond within that period, another winner will be chosen.
• Entries can be submitted until Monday, November 30, at 7 a.m. EST.

NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. MUST BE LEGAL RESIDENT OF ONE OF THE 50 UNITED STATES OR D.C., 18 YEARS OF AGE OR OLDER AT DATE OF ENTRY INTO SWEEPSTAKES. VOID IN PUERTO RICO, ALL U.S. TERRITORIES AND POSSESSIONS AND WHERE PROHIBITED BY LAW. Sweepstakes ends at 7 AM ET on November 30, 2009. See official rules for details.

Good luck.

Come back Monday for our next holiday giveaway. Monday's prize will be a Vizio 32-inch LCD TV.

(Credit: CNET)

Last month we blogged about a bug marring Flash playback on the latest 27-inch Apple iMacs. Users on several Web sites, including the Apple Discussion Threads, noticed a problem with the Flash player that caused choppy audio and video playback, but it appears that the newest Mac OS X v10.6.2 update fixes the issue that was apparently caused by a conflict with the Airport driver.

According to Apple, the update "addresses video playback and performance issues for iMac (21.5-inch, late 2009) and iMac (27-inch, late 2009) computers that may occur in some situations while AirPort is turned on." Since our own 27-inch iMac also experienced slow Flash streaming and intermittent sound hiccups with the AirPort turned on, we downloaded the 10.6.2 update and left it to sleep overnight.

Prior to the update, the Flash Player consumed 114.4 percent of system resources, but 24 hours after the update we're happy to report 26.8 percent usage in the activity monitor and smooth performance across all popular streaming video Web sites like YouTube, Hulu, etc.

Much thanks to the Apple Forums and Apple itself for quickly addressing the needs of its community. If you haven't updated yet, simply choose Software Update from the Apple menu to install OS X v10.6.2.

G-Tech's new 2TB 7200 rpm-based external storage devices.

(Credit: G-Tech)

It's not hard these days to find external storage devices that offer 2TB or even 4TB of storage. However, most of them use low-power and relatively low-performance internal hard drives, such as the My Book series from Western Digital or the FreeAgent series from Seagate. If you are looking for top speed and top capacity form external storage solutions for your Mac, G-Tech has some news for you.

The company announced Monday that it now incorporates Hitachi's 2TB, 7,200rpm, 32MB cache buffer SATA hard drives across its entire 3.5-inch product line, offering different storage solutions from single-volume external hard drive to RAID systems, with capacities ranging from 2TB to 32TB.

The company's newly refreshed products include the G-DRIVE, G-SAFE, G-RAID, G-SPEED eS, G-SPEED eS Pro, G-SPEED eS PRO XL, and the G-SPEED FC XL. With these new products, G-Tech claims that it's now the first in the world that offers a complete line of 2TB, 7,200 RPM drive-based external storage solutions, specifically designed for the Mac computer and audio- and video-editing markets.

G-Tech's new storage solutions comes with virtually all existing connections, from USB 2.0, FireWire and eSATA for desktop external drives to miniSAS and Fibre Channel for high-end RAID storage systems. The fact that now it uses the top 2TB capacity hard drives means that customers can significantly increase the amount of storage while retaining the same physical footprint.

The new G-Tech external storage devices are available now with premium prices ranging from $379 for the simple desktop 2TB G-Drive, $3,599 for the high-end 8TB G-Speed eS Pro to tens of thousands of dollars for other high-end storage systems.

The Maestro 5310's roomy 5-inch screen makes for much easier viewing.

(Credit: Amazon)

Shopping for a GPS? You can get one with a 3.5-inch screen for as little as $50, a 4.3-inch screen for under $100, or a 5-inch screen for--well, these models are relatively rare, so prices start at around $300 and rise sharply from there.

Not today. TigerDirect has a refurbished Magellan Maestro 5310 5-inch GPS for $129.99 shipped.

What's the big deal about a 5-inch display? That seemingly small amount of extra screen estate makes maps easier to view and onscreen menus easier to operate. Consequently, I'd say it's a safer GPS than one with a 3.5-inch screen.

The Maestro offers everything else you'd want in a GPS, too, including text-to-speech (i.e. it pronounces street names), 6 million points of interest, a windshield mount, and optional real-time traffic.

Even if you don't spring for a traffic subscription (which costs $60 annually after a free three-month trial), you can use the Maestro's SmartDetour feature to plot a route around suddenly slow or stopped traffic.

You don't get a lot of fancy frills like Bluetooth or a media player, but I consider that stuff fairly superfluous anyway. The big screen is the big attraction here, and the traffic option is icing on the cake.

CNET hasn't reviewed the 5310, but the handful of user reviews over at Amazon are overwhelmingly positive.

Because this is a refurb, the warranty expires after 90 days. As always, I think that's a potential positive: whatever problem might have existed has already been corrected.

In any case, this deal has been running all weekend, so there's a chance it'll be ending soon. If you're in the market for a nav system and you'd budgeted $100 or so anyway, I'd definitely consider paying a little extra for this big, beautiful screen.

(Credit: CNET)

After reading Engadget's report citing recent complaints about Flash video playback mucking up system resources on the latest 27-inch Apple iMacs, we decided to test out the claims using our own system. Users on the Apple Discussion threads noticed a bug in the Flash Player that bogs down CPU processes, resulting in choppy audio and video playback.

We visited several sites with heavy streaming video content like Hulu, YouTube, and the Break Media Network, and experienced similar issues: popping sounds and jerky video rendering the content unwatchable on several accounts. Like many of the users in the Apple thread, we called up the Activity Monitor and saw that the Flash Player demanded a surprising 114.4 percent of the iMac's CPU processes.

We were able to temporarily fix the problem by putting the computer to sleep and waking it up, but some people are speculating that a hardware malfunction could be to blame. We've also tried to contact Apple for official word, but our messages have been as yet unreturned.

If you're experiencing similar problems, we'd like to hear about it--leave a comment and let us know the issue and what you did to fix it.

Unlike most drive enclosures, this one has a built-in USB cable.

(Credit: Froobi)

If you've ever upgraded the hard drive in your laptop (or thought about doing so), you've probably wondered what to do with the old drive. After all, it's still perfectly good storage.

Answer: Turn it into an external, USB hard drive. All you need is an enclosure, a sturdy casing for the drive that provides an IDE interface and USB connection.

Today only, deal-a-day site Froobi has a SimpleTech 2.5-inch USB external hard drive enclosure for free (plus $5.95 for shipping).

The enclosure is very compact, measuring roughly 0.75 inch thick by 3 inches wide by 5.1 inches long. It'll slip easily into any carry-on bag.

What I like most is the built-in USB cable, which tucks away inside the enclosure when not in use. That's one less cable to remember to bring along, to potentially lose, or to add extra clutter to your carry-on.

I've performed laptop hard-drive transplants before; they're a cinch. And trust me when I say you'll love having a small, lightweight, portable hard drive. They're perfect for on-the-run backups, transferring large files, and extra storage when you need it.

This deal expires at midnight tonight (ET), and it could definitely sell out before then. If you're planning a laptop upgrade (or you've already got a naked displaced drive lying around), this is a no-brainer buy.

(By the way, if you miss out on this offer, there's a vendor on eBay selling similar enclosures for $7 shipped--though they don't have the built-in USB cable.)

This 32-inch Sony LCD has a 90-day warranty and a $369.99 price tag.

(Credit: Sony)

Here's something you don't see every day: a Sony HDTV selling for the same price as low-end closeout junkers. That's because SonyStyle has been cutting some serious deals on refurbished gear lately.

And here's the latest: a Sony KDL32L500 32-inch LCD HDTV for $369.99 shipped.

This is a 720p flat-panel (1080 just isn't necessary for a screen of this size) with inputs aplenty: three HDMI, two component video, and one PC. If you need more than that, well, you've got too much gear!

Other perks include dynamic backlight control, which automatically adjusts image brightness, and support for various other Sony products via Bravia Link (so you can control everything via one remote).

CNET hasn't reviewed this particular model, but over at Amazon (where it sells new for $450), users rated it four stars out of five.

Because this is a refurb, the warranty expires after 90 days--pretty typical for a deal like this. I wouldn't let that stop me from scooping up what looks to be a very nice 32-inch HDTV for an unusually low price.