Toshiba Corporation today announced that it will launch two-lane SPDT switches that support PCI Express 3.0 (8 Gbps). The new products, TC7PCI3412MT and TC7PCI3415MT, reduce switch terminal capacitance to achieve high bandwidth characteristics of 10GHz at -3dB, making high-speed transmission with lower signal degradation capable.

The new SPDT switches have optimal configurations for all arrangements of PCI Express slots, connectors, and switches on the motherboards of desktop PCs and notebook PCs. They can also be used for high-speed differential lines, such as USB3.0, DisplayPort1.2, and SATA3.0. Samples are available now with mass production scheduled for the end of January.

QNAP Systems, Inc. announced today a major expansion of the number of compatible peripherals available for its Turbo NAS products. The major additions include ten 3.5-inch internal SATA hard drives and a Kingston 2.5-inch internal SATA hard drive.
The newly compatible 3.5" internal SATA hard drives:

• Seagate - ST2000DM001 (2TB), ST2000NC000 (2TB), ST1000NC000 (1TB), ST3000NM0033 (Constellation ES.3) (3TB), ST2000NM0033 (Constellation ES.3) (2TB), ST1000NM0033 (Constellation ES.3) (1TB), ST500DM002 (500GB)
• Western Digital - WD4000FYYZ (4TB), WD3000FYYZ (3TB), WD2000FYYZ (2TB)
  The newly compatible 2.5" internal SATA hard drive:
• Kingston - SSDNow E100 (100GB)

The Slidebook S20, the ideal mobile work station and leisure companion, just hit the market. Its elegant streamlined exterior, all-in-one design, Intel's third generation Ivy Bridge Core i5 processor, and all-weather, long-life battery meet are designed to meet your work and leisure needs and make the Slidebook S20 stand out from the crowd of other ultrabooks.

Another MSI ingenious design, the Slidebook S20 not only offers all the audiovisual, multimedia, reading, and gaming enjoyment of a tablet, it also sports a keyboard, USB, and HDMI capabilities of a mobile office notebook. This chicly mobile machine satisfies the needs of both on-the-go businesspeople and students and the extended battery power ensures that you have plenty of time to do what you're doing. Ideal for Internet browsing, social networking, and word processing, the Slidebook S20 is the perfect choice for anybody on the go. The S20's design with keyboard and sliding cover eliminates the limitations most people feel when they use tablets. MSI's innovative, user-friendly design have you the user in mind.

In addition to the Stackable 3.5-inch SATA enclosures, Japanese company Logitec introduced the LBD-PMF6U3HBKW slim-line external Blu-ray writer drive. Taking advantage of USB 3.0 SuperSpeed, with a single cable for both power and host connectivity, the LBD-PMF6U3HBKW supports streamed digital broadcast recording, which writes Blu-ray discs much in the same was as VCRs would, given of course, if it's configured with the right kind of TVs or PCs with the required software (DiXiM BD Burner 2013).

The LBD-PMF6U3HBKW otherwise supports Blu-ray XL 4-layer and 3-layer writing at 4X, BD-RE XL at 2X, double- and single-layer BD-R discs at 6X, DVDs at up to 8X, and CDs at up to 24X. Measuring 136 x 142 x 19 mm (WxDxH), it weighs 300 g. TotalMediaRecord 2 and TotalMediaTheater 2 come bungled. It is priced around 9,800¥ (US $117).

OCZ Technology Group, Inc., a leading provider of high-performance solid-state drives (SSDs) for computing devices and systems, today announced that it has initiated a beta test program for its Linux Acceleration (LXL) Software development and invites its enterprise SSD customers to participate. The new OCZ LXL Software is a fast caching storage solution for OCZ's portfolio of enterprise SSDs and designed specifically for Linux-based physical and virtual environments.

OCZ's unique LXL Software provides a new integrated approach for making application-optimized data cache selections while minimizing I/O access times to SSD flash. It achieves this type of dynamic cache selection optimization by splitting the caching policy engine between the core mechanism running in the Linux kernel and an advanced statistical out-of-band analysis module that optimally determines which data needs to be placed in the cache and stores the data locally in OCZ enterprise-SSDs. The LXL software supports a wide range of OCZ enterprise solid state solutions across multiple interfaces (i.e. Z-Drive R4 PCIe Series, the Talos 2 SAS Series and the Deneva 2 SATA Series).

Kingfast rolled out the K25 Ultra cache-SSD. Featuring 32 GB of MLC NAND flash, the drive comes bundled with a license to use NVELO DataPlex SSD caching software, with which you can accelerate your existing HDD-based machine, without re-installing anything. The K25 Ultra is built into the 2.5-inch 7 mm-thick SATA 3 Gb/s form-factor, which makes it ultra-thin friendly. While an accelerated HDD's performance will depend on various other factors, the drive itself can dole out 270 MB/s sequential reads, and 190 MB/s sequential writes. It is priced at $58.

Introducing the FlexCage MB973SP-1B, a 3-in-2 Tray-less SATA Backplane Cage for 3.5" SATA hard drives. This is a commercially designed product in the FlexCage series for use in server environments, such as towers or rackmounts. This FlexCage incorporates the best technologies to meet those demands, with second to none fit, function, and reliability.

The MB973SP-1B has been designed to maximize space use by allowing up to 3 x 3.5" SATA III hard drives, while only consuming two 5.25" device bays. The FlexCage also only requires two 4-pin power ports (or two 15-pin power ports with included 4 pin to 15 pin adapter cables), to power up to three 3.5" hard drives. In order to further the convenience of the FlexCage, our renowned tray-less technology is integrated into the cage -- no screws or tools are required to insert or eject the drives, making hot swapping a completely hassle free experience. However, because of the tray-less technology used, maintenance becomes dramatically reduced to simply ejecting a failed drive, and then reinserting the replacement.

Toshiba Corporation today announced that samples of two new large capacity nearline hard disk drives (HDDs) are available now. The 3.5-inch 7,200 rpm MG Series includes both SATA and SAS versions, "MG03ACA400" and "MG03SCA400" respectively, that deliver 4TB[1] of storage, the largest capacity yet offered by Toshiba. Samples of lower capacity models in each series are also available.

As business works to keep up with the explosion of unstructured data, large capacity HDDs are crucial tools in IT systems designed to organize and access fast growing reservoirs of valuable information. The massive capacities of the MG Series drives are suited to RAID storage and arrays, tiered virtual infrastructures for public and private cloud deployments, archives and disk-based backup.

I-O Data of Japan announced the HDUs-UT line of colorful 2.5-inch SATA HDD/SSD enclosures, which support USB 3.0, and could in the future, support Thunderbolt with the help of an accessory. The HDUs-UT isn't much more than an enclosure with its active component being built into an adapter that plugs into the SATA drive on one end, and USB 3.0 power/data on the other. I-O Data could sell Thunderbolt variants of this adapter in the future. Measuring 81 x 120 x 15 mm (WxDxH), the enclosure weighs about 170 g with a typical HDD. It is available in silver, black, red, and blue brushed aluminum body options.

Solid state drive (SSD) is gradually making its way to become the mainstream in 3C product market. Team Group Inc., one of the leading memory manufacturers in the world, is making improvement in SSD product development by launching the ultra-thin Team Ultra L1 SSD. As thin as 7mm, the Team Ultra L1 SSD is the most lightweight and compact model which can be installed directly onto new generation of Ultrabooks for faster booting and read/write speed. Combined with the inherent advantage of shock resistance and stability of SSD, it signifies significant improvement of computer performance and durability.

Team Ultra L1 SSD is provided with SATA III 6Gb/s high-speed interface. The compact profile and special titanium color finishing highlight the product's high quality and the sense of modern technology. The continuous read and write speeds go as high as 550MB/s and 520MB/s, respectively. The random write-in speed for small files of 4K reaches up to 80,000 IOPS, not only fast but stable. In addition, the integration of Dura Write and RAISE (Redundant Array of Independent Silicon Elements) provides support for S.M.A.R.T. and full compatibility with Win7 Trim commands. It gives the hard drive a boost of burst random writing and effective improvement of computer's ability to respond and multiplexing performance, making the hard drive a storage solution of extreme speed for consumers.

Still using an old case with not much front-panel connectivity? This one's for you. Japanese peripherals maker Ainex announced the PF-213CR3, a 3.5-inch front-panel that adds a plethora of connectivity. It includes two common USB 2.0/1.1 ports, two high-powered (800 mA) USB 2.0/1.1 ports (yellow), which allow quicker charging of smartphones and tablets, a USB 3.0 port, an HDMI port, a multi-format card reader, and a USB 3.0 SuperSpeed port. The device draws power from a SATA power connector, to drive its card-reader and high-power USB ports. It connects to the system over standard USB 2.0/1.1 front-panel header, standard USB 3.0 header, and common HDMI. Slated for December 18, it is priced at 3,980¥ (US $48).

It will be towards the end of 2013, when Western Digital will have 5 terabyte (or 5000 GB) models of its NAS-optimized WD Red, and energy-efficient consumer-optimized WD Green lines of consumer hard drives. According to launch plans unearthed by Russian website AlwaysMoreDigital, the 5 TB WD Red (model: WD50ERFX) and 5 TB WD Green (WD50EZRX) will be launched in Q4 (in or after October 2013). A little earlier than that, the two lines will be updated with 4 TB variants, the WD40ERFX and WD40EZRX. All four drives feature 64 MB of cache, SATA 6 Gb/s interface, and are built in the 3.5-inch form-factor.

Thin and light with long battery life, Acer America today announced availability of the new TravelMate B113 notebook PC for U.S. and Canadian customers. An ideal solution for institutional customers, the TravelMate B113 meets all the needs for productivity, communication and mobility needed in today's e-learning environment.

"Acer has had great success with the 11.6-inch form factor in the education market because their compact size is ideal in a classroom setting, even for the youngest of students," said Michael O'Beirne, Acer senior director, commercial product marketing. "The TravelMate B113 notebook is an important addition to our notebook portfolio, as it combines everything educators and students need, including exceptional performance, durability and reliability for a best-in-class mobile experience."

HighPoint Technologies, Inc., the industry's leading SATA 6Gb/s RAID HBA manufacturer, announces the availability of their second generation SATA 6Gb/s storage controllers - the RocketRAID 600L series. HighPoint's RocketRAID 600L series HBA's represent the industry's most comprehensive, and affordable selection of 6Gb/s SATA PCIe host controllers. Powered by industry-proven RAID technology, SATA port multiplier support, and an intuitive RAID Management Suite, HighPoint RocketRAID 600L HBA's are the ideal SATA 6Gb/s storage solution for any PC and Mac computing platform.

Have tons of hard-drives plugged to internal ports in your machine? Want control over which ones stay on, and don't trust your OS or apps to wake random drives up from their slumber, stepping up noise and power draw? Orico has a solution for you. The HD-PW6102 is an accessory that fits into any of your multiple empty 5.25-inch drive bays, and gives you manual switches to six SATA power cables. The device draws power from two 4-pin Molex connectors, and gives out six SATA power cables, which are sleeved. Each of the six cables can be manually plugged out of the box.

To use the HD-PW6102 properly, the SATA controller needs to be set in AHCI mode, with hot-plugging enabled. The device manually gates power to drives to turn them off. With AHCI hot-plugging enabled, you can use the "safely remove hardware" menu in your system tray to deactivate a drive before switching it off with the device. To use the drive again, simply switch it on, and the OS mounts it like any other PnP storage volume. In addition to push-switches, it has power indicators for each of the six drives. The main body and front bezel are made of brushed aluminum. The accessory started selling in Orico's homeland China, where it's priced at 373 RMB (US $60).

Super Talent Technology, a leading manufacturer of NAND Flash storage solutions and DRAM memory modules, and South Korean fabless semiconductor company Novachips Inc. announces a development project to make the dedicated Automotive Solid State Drive (SSD) based on Novachips SATA 6Gbps SSD controller, NVS3600.

Super Talent is a leading manufacturer and provider of Automotive SSD that currently delivers the SATA 3 6Gbps-based automotive SSD as the main storage device of the AVN system mounted on a luxury car. It is the world's first SSD mounted on the AVN system for regular cars.

Acer America today announced new commercial desktop PCs designed specifically for businesses, schools and government agencies. Fast processing, a tool-less design and essential security and management tools make the new Veriton Series desktops ideal for powering mainstream productivity applications in professional environments.

The Acer Veriton L4620G is an ultra small form factor (ULSF) desktop with prices starting at $599. This platform is compatible with the Acer ErgoStand that is easy to set up and connect to a range of Acer monitors to create a streamlined all-in-one system. Other new models include the Acer Veriton X4620G, a small form factor (SFF) desktop and the Acer Veriton M4620G, a mini tower, both with prices beginning at $619. All models come with a three-year warranty and support up to a third-generation Intel Core i7 processor, which provides significant application and graphics performance benefits compared to prior generations.

I-O Data of Japan introduced a pair of new Blu-ray drives, the BRD-S16X and BRD-UT16X. The two are capable of writing Blu-ray ROM discs at 16X, and can write four-layer Blu-ray XL discs at lower speeds. The BRD-S16X is built in the internal 5.25" form-factor, with SATA 3 Gb/s interface. The BRD-UT16X, on the other hand, is the same drive built into an external USB 3.0 enclosure, measuring 158 x 220 x 50 mm, weighing about 1.1 kg. Both drives feature 4 MB write cache. Bundled software includes Corel WinDVD 10, Roxio Blu-ray Creator, and Nero 12 OEM.

In addition to the 16X BD-R write speeds, the two can burn double-layer BD-R at 12X, triple- and quad-layer BD-Rs and BD-R LTH at 6X; single-, double-, and triple-layer BD-RE at 8X, 6X, and 4X, respectively. The BRD-S16X is priced at 14,280¥ (US $173.7), while the BRD-UT16X will go for 19,845¥ ($242.4). The two are slated for market release in December.

OCZ Technology Group, Inc., a leading provider of high-performance solid-state drives (SSDs) for computing devices and systems, today announced the availability of its new SATA III-based Vector SSD Series featuring the company's next-generation Indilinx Barefoot 3 controller. OCZ's worldwide technology hardware and firmware teams developed the new controller silicon and firmware completely in-house to enable full design control over the Vector SSD Series roadmap, while delivering exceptional I/O performance, enhanced reliability and endurance, and a host of differentiated features to empower high performance laptops, desktops, and workstations with superior storage capabilities.

OCZ Vector SSDs provide exceptional input/output operations per second (IOPS) performance and the cutting-edge Barefoot 3 controller consistently delivers superior sustained performance over time regardless of whether the data streams are in compressed or uncompressed formats. As a result, this groundbreaking SSD series provides faster file transfers and boot-ups, and a quicker, more responsive storage experience.

In addition to cooking up some new platter-based storage, Buffalo has introduced two optical drives capable of burning a Blu-ray disc (BD-R to be exact) at up to 16x speed. Seen below, the BRXL-16FBS-BK (internal, SATA connectivity) and BRXL-16U3 (external, USB 3.0) have support for BDXL discs, and also deliver writing speeds of 12x for BD-R DL, 6x for BDXL, 2x for BD-RE, 16x for DVD-R/+R, 8x for DVD-R DL/+R DL/+RW, 6x for DVD-RW, 5x for DVD-RAM, 48x for CD-R and 24x for CD-RW.

The BRXL-16FBS-BK and BRXL-16U3 cost $255 and $322, respectively, and come with a software bundle which includes PowerDVD10 BD edition, PowerDirector 8 HE, PowerProducer 5, Power2Go 7, PowerBackup 2, InstantBurn 5 and MediaShow 5.

Buffalo Inc. has today announced the OP-HD4.0T/LS, a 4 TB replacement hard drive for the LinkStation Pro Duo and CloudStation NAS servers (and other 4 TB-supporting devices). This RAID1-ready 3.5-inch drive features a SATA interface, has a recommended price tag of about $679 and is set to start shipping at the end of this month.

WD, a Western Digital company and a world leader in hard drives, today announced its highest performance, highest capacity desktop hard drive, the WD Black 4 TB, 3.5-inch, 7200 RPM drive. Shipping immediately, the fast performance and ultimate capacity of the award-winning WD Black drives make them perfect for gaming, high-performance desktop systems and workstations.

WD Black hard drives combine 7200 RPM spin speed, 64 MB cache, dual stage actuator technology, SATA 6 gigabits per second (Gb/s) interface, and an integrated dual processor to deliver ultimate performance in a maximum-capacity drive.

On Monday, gaming PC builder CyberPowerPC blurted out pictures of a fascinating new cubical case from Cooler Master. The case turns out to be the HAF-XB. Measuring 442(W) x 330(H) x 423(D)mm, the case supports ATX, micro-ATX, and mini-ITX motherboards, and features a compartmentalized design. The motherboard tray is arranged on the top compartment, along the plane of the base. The top compartment is spacious enough for CPU coolers that are 180 mm tall, and graphics cards that are 334 mm long. Two 120 mm front intake fans and a 120 mm rear spinner maintain positive air pressure within the compartment.

The bottom half of the case is dedicated to storage and PSU bays. These include two 3.5-inch hotswap SATA caddies, which can be internally converted to six 2.5-inch bays, and two 5.25-inch drive bays. In addition to the push-pull fans of the top compartment, the case features a 200 mm top exhaust, and provision for two 80 mm rear exhaust fans. The case is expected to be priced at US $100. Find a complete review at the source.

Going into 2013, Intel's tough balancing act between keeping a low power/thermal envelope, and advancing performance, all while staying on the 22 nm silicon fab process, will be care of its Core "Haswell-ULT" processor. The chip will feature some radical changes to traditional Intel processor design, which will help it achieve its design goals. According to a deck of leaked slides scored by Expreview, Intel plans to use additional C-states that drop the processor's base clock, and redesign the processor package to accommodate the PCH silicon, reducing the board footprint.

To begin with, Haswell-ULT will be designed to support 24 MHz base clock speed, which running in "deep" energy-saving idle states. Modern processors with FSB replacement interconnect technologies such as QuickPath Interconnect and HyperTransport need a base clock to time other components on the processor, and for low-level communications, while a bulk of the data is transported by the primary interconnect. Intel found a way to turn off the 100 MHz base clock signal (which is also used to time the PCI-Express root complex and integrated graphics core), and replace it with a 24 MHz clock, when the processor is idling. As the processor returns to lower (more active) C-states, the 100 MHz base clock is reapplied. The 24 MHz base clock is activated by three new power states, C8, C9, and C10, introduced by Haswell-ULT. The third slide below details what happens to the various components in the new C-states.

HighPoint Technologies, Inc., a leading SAS/SATA HBA and storage solutions manufacturer, proudly announces that its entire line-up of 6Gb/s SAS and SATA RAID PCI-Express 2.0 host bus adapters are Windows 8 ready: RocketRAID 4500 Series SAS 6Gb/s Hardware RAID HBA's, RocketRAID 2700 series SAS 6Gb/s Host RAID HBA's, RocketRAID 600 Series SATA 6Gb/s Host RAID HBA's, and RocketU Series USB 3.0 HBA's. HighPoint has actively supported every major Windows operating system from the early days of 3.1, to the recent debut of Windows 8. Our extensive line of 6Gb/s SAS RAID, 6Gb/s SATA RAID, and USB 3.0 HBA's are ideal storage solutions for any Windows 8 platform.