Strontium Technology has announced a new series of high-performance solid state drives (SSDs) named HAWK. These Hynix-built solid state drives with Strontium branding are based on SandForce's SF2281 controller and SK Hynix Flash. These drives are said to be a good upgrade option featuring 500MB/s of read and write performance and also claim to offer faster performance for PCs and Macs. Needless to say, SSDs feature enhanced durability, shock-proof, silent operation and are more reliable as compared to traditional hard drives.

The 2.5-inch HAWK drive is available in 120GB and 240GB storage capacities. The sequential (256KB, MAX) read speed is 510 MB/s and write speed is 470 MB/s. The random (4KB, MAX) performance is 50,000 IOPS read and 38,000 IOPS write. It comes with support for SATA I/ II/ III interface, TRIM Support (O/S support required) and has a Mean Time between Failures (MBTF) of 1.2M. Strontium HAWK SSD has been designed to offer quicker boot up and shorter lead time in the loading of applications to enhance productivity.

I-O Data introduced the HDPX-UT line of portable hard drives. With a thickness of just 9 mm, the drives are designed to go well alongside Ultrabooks. The drives feature brushed aluminum exteriors, and are available in three color options: black (HDPX-UTK), gold (HDPX-UTG), and silver (HDPX-UTS). The drives provide 500 GB of storage using a 7 mm-thick internal SATA HDD, and are bus-powered, with a single USB 3.0/2.0 connection for power and host connectivity. The drives provide 256-bit AES data encryption, with installers for encryption software included. Measuring 75 x 110 x 9 mm (W x D x H), the drives weigh about 125 g. Slated for mid-September, the HDPX-UT is expected to be priced at 11,130 JPY (US $140).

Greenliant Systems, a leader in energy-efficient, highly secure and reliable solid state storage products, is now sampling its industrial temperature SATA and PATA interface NANDrive embedded solid state drives (SSDs) using 2-bits-per-cell (MLC) NAND flash memory. The new NANDrive devices are the first ball grid array (BGA) package SATA / PATA SSDs based on MLC NAND that are capable of operating at temperatures between -40 to +85 degrees Celsius.

NANDrive combines Greenliant's internally developed NAND controller with NAND flash die for a fully integrated SSD in a multi-chip package. SATA and PATA NANDrive products have the same pin-out across all capacities in each family to ensure backward compatibility and simplify board design. The BGA package allows for easy and firm mounting to a system motherboard, and the 1mm ball pitch increases long-term reliability for applications enduring mechanical shock, vibration and temperature cycling.

While PC user is more and more concerning high performance and high quality SSD, the world renowned memory and Flash module manufacturer, KINGMAX, recently launches high performance SATA III Client Pro SSD - SMU 32 and SMU35. Adopting Sandforce controller and high speed synchronous Flash memory, Client Pro SSD delivers sequential read/write speed up to 550MB/s, 520MB/s, and 4KB random write speed up to 85,000 IOPS. Its superior performance meets needs for every user, no matter for advanced gaming, multitasking or multimedia computing.

KINGMAX SATA III Client Pro SSD is based on powerful Sandforce controller and the latest firmware technology, which is able to maximize performance, extend product endurance and lifetime and enhance data protection and reliability. Since synchronous Flash is the higher grade memory, it achieves the better performance and the longer lifetime than asynchronous flash does, especially the performance under random write. For general users, synchronous Flash keeps high performance last after long term usages.

Drobo, makers of award-winning data storage products for businesses and professionals, today announced a refresh of its flagship Drobo B1200i. The new B1200i SSD boosts performance by up to 300 percent over previous versions of the product, fueled by Drobo's patent-pending automated data-tiering software and the unique hybrid use of solid state technology alongside traditional hard disk drives (SAS or SATA). The B1200i SSD is ideal as primary storage for up to 250 users or as Tier 2 storage and backup for departments in larger organizations. Existing B1200i customers can upgrade to the new performance and functionality via a free software downloaded here.

Toshiba's Storage Products Business Unit of Toshiba America Electronic Components, Inc., a committed technology leader, today announced it is expanding its enterprise Solid State Drives (eSSD) family with the PX-Series, featuring three models targeted for various enterprise applications: boot, read-intensive, entry level servers; entry-to-mid-range application servers; and high-performance enterprise application servers. The PX-Series reflects Toshiba's continued storage innovation and coincides with the company's celebration of its 25th anniversary as the inventor of NAND flash technology. Each model is optimized for its target segment with NAND flash processes, capacity, interface support, and capabilities.

OCZ Technology Group, Inc., a leading provider of high-performance solid-state drives (SSDs) for computing devices and systems, will showcase its latest storage products, encompassing a mix of both solid state drives and software solutions, at this year's Flash Memory Summit, Booth #208, Santa Clara Convention Center, Santa Clara, California, from August 21st through August 23rd.

Demonstrating SSD products along with recent partner implementations, OCZ will showcase a comprehensive lineup of innovative solutions for business, server, and OEM clients. This includes product presentations of both the impending Intrepid 3 SATA III-based SSD solution based on the company's Indilinx Everest 2 architecture, along with the company's leading PCI Express (PCIe)-based Z-Drive R4 featuring new Linux Acceleration software (LXL) that unleashes the full performance potential of infrastructures that use this popular open source operating system. Live technical demos of LXL and Z-Drive R4 SSDs will include a VDI boot storm, efficient SQL CPU utilization, and vMotion and Fault Tolerance support.

Before starting to establish a new PC system, end users have to consider a lot of options. With the new Hoplite ST, Enermax presents the perfect solution for every system build, no matter if it comes to a simple office system or to a powerful gaming setup. Therefore, the mid-range case even supports over-sized high-performance graphics cards with up to 403mm length. End users profit from a comfortable, tool-less mounting system for HDD, ODD and extension cards and a well-thought cable management with a lot of space behind the mainboard tray.

Acer America today unveiled new commercial desktop PCs specified for corporate customers, government agencies and educational institutions. Multi-monitor support, significant power and expandability make the new Veriton 6620G Series desktops well-suited for enterprise environments.

The Acer Veriton X6620G, a small form factor (SFF) desktop and the Acer Veriton M6620G, a mini tower, offer a three-year warranty(1) and support up to a third-generation Intel Core i7 processor with significant application and graphics performance benefits when compared to prior generations.

Designed for professionals seeking a solid business notebook that delivers robust productivity, manageability, security and reliability features, Acer America today introduced the new TravelMate P243 notebook PC for U.S. customers.

"Today's mobile business executive needs a PC that is robust enough to run intensive business applications while still fitting into strict budget guidelines," said Gregg Prendergast, vice president of commercial sales for Acer America. "The TravelMate P243 notebook is an important addition to our professional notebook portfolio as it combines everything today's road warrior requires, including exceptional performance, enterprise-level security, durability and manageability for a best-in-class mobile experience."

RAIDON announced the Runner R2420-B3, a dual 2.5-inch SATA external enclosure. It can enclose two 9.5 mm-thick 2.5-inch SATA hard drives or solid-state drives, and offers RAID capabilities. The two drives are held in place by caddies that eject the drive when the lid is opened (push to eject).

The SATA 3 Gb/s controller offers RAID JBOD, RAID 0 (performance) and RAID 1 (redundancy) modes, which can be configured by setting a pair of DIP switches on the back of the enclosure. The controller connects to the host using USB 3.0 interface. The enclosure draws power from an external 5V AC adapter. Measuring 174 mm x 105 mm x 33 mm (L x W x H), its dry-weight is about 490 g. The company did not give out pricing information.

OCZ Technology Group, Inc. (NASDAQ: OCZ) today reported that Arthur F. Knapp Jr., 63, Chief Financial Officer, announced his intent to retire from the Company. Mr. Knapp will remain as CFO until his successor is in place and then provide ongoing support to help ensure a seamless transition.

"Art has been a valuable member of our management team since 2005 and he has contributed to the success of transforming the organization from a small high-performance memory Company to a leader in the SSD market," said Ryan Petersen, CEO of OCZ Technology Group. "On behalf of the Company, I want to thank Art for his dedicated service and look forward to working with him through the search process for a new CFO."

Transcend Information, Inc. (Transcend), a worldwide leader in storage and multimedia products, today announced the arrival of its new 2.5" SATA III 6Gb/s SSD320 solid state drive (SSD) - a welcome addition to Transcend's successful and ever-growing line of SSDs. With impressive transfer rates and excellent long-term reliability, users upgrading their existing computer with an SSD320 are guaranteed to get the best performance results at an astonishingly affordable price.

Intel plans to standardize SSD specifications for its Ultrabook platform, which would steer it toward slimmer, faster Ultrabooks. The company plans to invite a large number of industry players, including NAND flash memory makers SanDisk, Micron, and Samsung, for discussions into what is known as Next Generation Form Factor (NGFF), a new SSD form-factor derived from mSATA (think Apple's SSD form-factor found in the MacBook Air).

Intel is in a bit of a hurry with its NGFF SSD plans because the current mSATA form-factor poses limitations, including limited PCB area, in which a limited number of ONFI channels can be wired out. NGFF most likely is mSATA with greater PCB area, allowing the same number of ONFI channels as 2.5-inch SSDs, with the latest generation of controllers and toggle-NAND flash memory. NGFF doesn't increase the thickness of the SSD compared to mSATA, but merely elongates it (again, similar in form to Apple's SSD specifications). Five length standards are being discussed between Intel and Ultrabook partners.

Every year, technology is able to become more and more advanced and is constantly improving. Also, with being physically the smallest, and performing the best is the end goal of any storage system. This is why SFF (Small Form Factor) storage systems are becoming more popular due to its low power consumption and space-saving benefits. With the advent of recent solid state technology, this allows 2.5" SSD's to easily achieve 500MB/sec in transfer rate, which overcomes the 3.5" SATA hard drives in every category except capacity. Therefore, maximize the capacity in a limited space becomes the most important task that many storage consulting firms are faced with often. For SFF systems, we introduce the Icy Dock MB992SK-B 2.5" SATA Mobile Rack solution for use in 3.5" device bays (Floppy bay).

Western Digital's new high-capacity 2.5-inch hard drive, the WD Green WD20NPVT made an appearance in Japanese ground stores. Strangely enough, while the drive is built in the 2.5-inch form-factor, it is 15 mm-thick, making it unfit for most notebooks. The drive provides a staggering 2 TB of unformatted capacity, and features IntelliPower variable spindle speed (4,500-5,400 RPM?), 8 MB cache, SATA 3 Gb/s interface, 0.2W idle (parked) and 1.7W (active) power consumption. It is priced at 18,800 JPY (US $240).

MOSAID Technologies Inc. today introduced HLSSD (HyperLink Solid State Drive), a SSD that achieves Terabyte-class storage capacity using a single controller device. MOSAID engaged PaxDisk of Korea to develop the Terabyte-class HLSSD.

MOSAID's Terabyte-class HLSSDs are optimized for data centers and the enterprise. Based on HLNAND (HyperLink NAND) technology, MOSAID's HLSSDs deliver scalability, performance, reliability and cost advantages over SSDs that use conventionally designed NAND Flash devices.

The new Thecus N4510U powered by Intel Atom with 2GB DDR3 RAM is a versatile 1U unit that offers enhanced performance, 4-bays for multiple RAID function, and link aggregation for easy expansion. It's perfect for the user who seeks a smaller NAS unit but requires the ability to integrate into a rack system.

The embedded Intel Atom CPU provides over-the-top performance to power on hungry NAS demands. In fact, utilizing a 64-bit driver allows the N4510U NAS to perform at its best. With HDMI output, USB 3.0 and hot-swap ability, the N4510U NAS packs powerful and dynamic features despite its 1U size. Attaching a TV tuner to the N4510U allows the ability to watch TV via your Thecus NAS. The flexibility of Thecus NAS elevates the user experience. In fact, not only watch TV but also record what you are watching directly to you NAS for instant media playback.

The new ThecusOS 5.0 has been released! This means that users will be able access more innovative functions with their Thecus NAS. Dedicated Thecus users know that Thecus NAS utilizes the best and most up-to-date hardware. The new ThecusOS 5.0 is the key piece that will unlock the most efficient and advanced NAS on the market. Ultimately, Thecus is a well-known innovator in the storage industry and ThecusOS 5.0 sets higher limits.

Century Japan released a new drive dock (model: CMRK-S4) for PCs with vacant 5.25-inch drive bays, which provides four 2.5-inch SATA hot-swap drive bays, supporting drives as thick as 12.5 mm (such as WD VelociRaptor without its heatsink, or Seagate Cheetah. The four bays have lockable caddies. Since this is a passive dock, the SATA connections are relayed to the back. The four bays are cooled by a 40 mm exhaust fan on the back. The fan spins at speeds of around 4,000 RPM, with noise output around 25 dBA. Measuring 145.7 x 149.3 x 41.6 mm (WxDxH), the dock weighs 500 g, owing to its mostly metallic built. Slated for early August, it is expected to be priced at 3,980 JPY (US $50).

VIA Technologies, Inc, a leading innovator of power efficient computing platforms, today announced the VIA VAB-800 Pico-ITX embedded ARM board. Featuring a choice of an 800MHz or a 1GHz Freescale ARM Cortex-A8 processor, the VIA VAB-800 combines a wide operating temperature range with extremely low power consumption to meet the demands of high-end industrial and in-vehicle fanless embedded applications.

Based on the industry standard 10 cm x 7.2 cm Pico-ITX form factor created by VIA, the VIA VAB-800 Pico-ITX board combines a rich I/O set with superb multimedia performance, supporting playback of the most demanding video formats in resolutions up to 1080p. Leveraging VIA's hardware design expertise, the VIA VAB-800 delivers the highest I/O integration on the Pico-ITX form factor for an ultra compact yet highly flexible platform for the latest embedded devices.

HighPoint Technologies is proud to announce the industry's first USB3.0 Storage Docks with dual-dedicated 5Gb/s per SATA bay architecture. Optimized for high-speed SATA 6Gb/s SSD's and hard disks, RocketStor Storage Docks are the perfect, high-performance storage companions for Ivy-Bridge based PC and Mac notebooks.

RocketStor Storage Docks leverage dual-dedicated 5Gb/s USB 3.0 engines to deliver the industry's fastest USB 3.0 bandwidth for high-speed SATA 6Gb/s SSD/HDD.

Thermaltake, being the industry pioneer brand with expertise in PC chassis, power supply and thermal solution, introduces the Muse 5G series, the next-generation external hard drive enclosure for authors, scientists and artists in the 21st century to unite their power and soul by collecting and protecting all precious inspiration.

Thermaltake Muse is named after the 9 goddesses of Greek mythology, poetry and literature. The goddesses are considered the source of knowledge that became the representatives of poetry, the arts and science, and sources of inspiration. Thermaltake, carring the corporate mission of "delivering the perfect user experience",has insight into the importance and the power of knowledge, thus specially developed the Muse 5G series in a high quality aluminum housing to provide a better heat dissipation as well as an elegant look like the goddesses we all have imagined.

Super Talent Technology, a leader of NAND Flash storage solutions, today announces their enduring, and most reliable SSD to date, the SATA3 SuperNova.

Whether you're a large corporation or a small company the Supernova provides the advantages to reduce TCO. The SuperNova features thermal conductive silicon padding which prevents overheating and requires less cooling. Increase the speed and lifetime of data along with the most secure encryption on the planet, and the proprietary RAISE technology that virtually eliminates unrecoverable read errors makes the SuperNova the ideal choice.

Patriot Memory, a global pioneer in high-performance memory, NAND flash, storage, and enthusiast computer products today launches its new wireless personal storage enclosure the Gauntlet Node. Previously announced as the Gauntlet Wifi, the Gauntlet Node will allow users to break free from the hardware limited storage options offered in today's most popular tablets, smart phones, and laptops by offering up to 1 terabyte of untethered external storage.

Providing an extremely flexible wireless storage solution, the Gauntlet Node can be fitted with any new or used 2.5" mechanical hard drive or solid state drive and is hot swappable for no hassle use with multiple drives. Using Gauntlet Connect, available through Google Play, Amazon App Store, and iTunes, the Gauntlet Node is capable of sharing or streaming to 8 connected devices for excellent on the go productivity or entertainment. Powered by a lithium ion battery, the Gauntlet Node can stream movies, music, and photos or transfer data continuously for up to 5.5 hours.