Toshiba, Samsung, WD Supply Storage Drives at CES

by Nathan Eddy

Small enough to fit in the palm of your hand and packing up to a whopping 1TB of storage space, the T1 supports USB 3.0 and comes with a three-year warranty. Other features include the company’s TurboWrite technology, which delivers much faster sequential write speeds, crucial for large file transfers. Also available in capacities of 250GB and 500GB, the drive caps all that technology with a sleek, streamlined finish.

The WRT Network Storage Bay holds two external Serial ATA (SATA) hard drives and features RAID-1 drive mirroring for improved backup and improved read speed versus eSATA/USB. The unit also features an eSATA and USB 3.0 port for connecting additional external drives. The technology stacks underneath a WRT1900AC or WRT1200AC router, helping to de-clutter desktops or closets. The storage bay is due to hit the market in the spring.

Available in two- and four-bay desktop models, the drive is powered by a dual core cortex A15 1.4GHz processor, 2GB of RAM and dual Gigabit Ethernet ports with Link Aggregation technology. A BTRFS file system offers five levels of data protection, and ReadyCloud technology means you can access files stored on your drive from anywhere, from any Web browser, using any Web-connected device. A green touch comes in the form of disk spin-down, which helps save energy.

This USB flash drive features both a micro-USB and a high-speed USB 3.0 connector for faster file transfers between On The Go (OTG)-enabled Android devices, PC and Mac computers. The company’s Memory Zone app gives users even greater control over their mobile device’s memory storage. The app is compatible with most Android-powered devices and allows users to locate, organize, transfer and back up data. The drive sports a retractable design as well as a longer micro-USB connector to accommodate device cases or port covers.

With the Canvio Connect II, users can access content remotely from mobile devices and back up content from mobile devices, and the technology includes 10GB of free cloud storage for storing copies of important files. Cloud-enabled backup lets users schedule it to run automatically, and they can do secure backups with user-defined password protection.

Designed for streaming and offloading of media from mobile devices, the Seagate Wireless drive comes in a range of vibrant colors, and content is accessed through the free mobile Seagate Media app for Apple iOS, Android, Kindle Fire HD and Windows 8 tablets. Mobile devices connect to Wireless over a WiFi connection, which the battery-powered drive emits once powered on.

Upgrade your ultra-thin notebook or tablet with a compact mSATA SSD with the Ultra II, which boosts overall system performance and adds up to half a terabyte of storage. Users with Windows- based devices can check their drive’s status in real-time and be alerted to software updates, while the drive is also resistant to vibration and temperature fluctuations, as well as being shock-proof.

This photo and video storage device is designed to connect to multiple compatible imaging devices; this allows users to store, view and share images and videos. The device features NFC capabilities and WiFi technology; users can tap the NFC icon on their compatible Canon digital camera or camcorder to automatically import new images and videos wirelessly to the CS100. The device also features Secure Digital (SD) and Compact Flash (CF) memory card slots and a USB connection for importing images from compatible devices that may not feature wireless capabilities.

Though it might be christened with an unwieldy name, the MQ03ABB300 is dexterous enough to handle the needs of multi-drive environments at home and in the office, and a power-efficient design also makes it a suitable solution for USB-connected external personal storage applications. Although it’s small in size, the 2.5-inch HDD achieves 750GB per platter, using a total of four platters to achieve storage of 3TB.

Storage specialist WD demonstrated what it claims to be the world’s fastest 4TB hybrid drive, which used the SATA Express PCI-e interface, 4TB 3.5-inch hybrid hard drive and up to 128GB SSD. In WD’s labs, the SATA Express 4TB drive with 64GB cache (though still a prototype) achieved a PCMark benchmark score of 4459, suggesting an intriguing value for performance ratio.