AIC - MAX I/O technology (Credit:L AIC)

Seagate also held a joint live demonstration with the U.S. Company “AIC”, which introduced its new MAX I/O technology and showcased the latest products from its SAS line. MAX I/O was designed to utilize PCI Express “directly at the source” – Intel’s MCH (memory controller hub), eliminating the need for expensive switches. Users can select their desired level of I/O expansion and actively manage the PCI Express lanes – either individually or grouped. The two companies demonstrated AIC’s SAS/SATA JBOD subsystems, which worked with Seagate’s Cheetah, Savvio, and Barracuda drives. 

Sandisk Vaulter Disk

Sandisk FlahsBack (Credit: Sandisk)

Iomega launched its REV 120GB Backup Drive, which is equipped with a USB 2.0 (for external use) and SATA interfaces (for internal use). REV removable hard disks are divided into two parts – the drive bay, which stores sensitive read-write heads and electronics, and a completely isolated low-cost removable disk, which hosts the platter and a fluid-dynamic bearing motor. The company says the biggest advantage of such unique design is speed, because the disks allow users to backup and restore data up to 10 times faster than tape drives. Additionally, a REV disk requires zero maintenance - it is sealed against contamination and integrates a virtual clean room environment. This is supported by automatic head-cleaning, air filtration, and two-stage error correction for automatic data verification. 

Iomega REV 120GB Backup Drive (Credit: Iomega)

Samsung announced the shipment of its newly developed 2.5’’ 500GB hard disk drive for laptop computers. The disk consists of three 167GB platters. The company says two such disks can fit into most notebook computers, providing an impressive 1TB storage capacity. Other specifications include a 5,800rpm spin rate, an 8MB cache, and a 3GBps SATA interface. This product is already available for purchase in the U.S. at a price of $300.
“Our customers require more and more notebook storage for their data, video, and music files,” said Andy Higginbotham, Director of Hard Drive Sales and Marketing, Samsung Semiconductor. “Our Spinpoint M6 easily fits within notebook PCs with no modification to the notebook PC chassis, giving users more storage power than ever before.”

Samsung new 64GB SSD

OCZ also unveiled SSD drives, which will be available in both 32GB and 64GB capacities. Patriot showcased one of the more impressive SSDs, with a 128GB capacity. The company also presented waterproof “Xporter XT” 32GB/64GB USB thumb drives, and announced it will be shipping them towards the middle of this year.  

Shortly before CeBIT, Corsair unveiled its 32GB USB thumb drive. At the show, the company showcased the new 16GB USB 2.0 “Voyager GT” flash drive model, with transfer rates 4 times higher than those of mainstream USB 2.0 thumb drives. Does anyone need to transfer a 1.5GB movie in under 2 minutes? The new drive is equipped with AES 256-bit encryption software, selected NAND flash chips, and "state-of-the-art" controller technology. It also sports a water and shock-resistant case, and is up for grabs at a price of $170.

Gigabyte Roll-Pad (Credit: Gigabyte)

Gigabyte also showcased its “Roll-Pad”, which is a roll-up aluminum pad that effectively draws the heat away from the bottom of the notebook PC. This patented notebook cooler, which was awarded this year’s ‘Product Design Award’, is now available for purchase for approximately $50.
  

The German company Open-E launched three update features to their Data Storage Server (DSS) product line, currently in its fourth generation. Users can set the software so that it will automatically switch over to a secondary storage server in case of a failure or scheduled maintenance of the primary storage server. The software is also equipped with the “Write-Once, Read-Many” (WORM) technology, which allows information to be written onto a particular disk only once, but to be read multiple times without being subject to erasures or modifications. According to the company, this archiving feature has special appeal to large institutions concerned about inadvertent loss of data. Another feature that was added to the new DSS line is the Network Data Management Protocol (NDMP) used to “control data backup and recovery communications between primary and secondary storage in heterogeneous network environments”. 

The American “Adaptec” Company launched its “Series 5” RAID controllers". The RAID controllers offer 28-port connectivity and allow up to 256 SATA or SAS drives to be connected to a single system, providing approximately 200TB of storage capacity. According to the company, the new x8 PCI Express controllers are five times faster than those sold by their competitors, reaching speeds of 250,000 I/Os per second and throughput rates of up to 1.2 GB/sec. “These efficient new PCIe interface controllers are designed for a wide range of storage-critical, bandwidth-intensive applications, such as Web hosting, digital video surveillance, medical imaging, and communications” – states the company. All of these newly launched products are already available on the market, their prices ranging from $425 to $1,595.

Memory

Corsair “Dominator” DDR3-2133MHz (Credit: Corsair)

OCZ Technology was one of the most impressive exhibitors at CeBIT this year. The company unveiled high-speed DDR3 memory modules capable of running at speeds as high as 2100MHz, at a relatively low voltage rate of 1.9V. These enthusiast-oriented modules come with OCZ’s “Flex2” cooling system, which employs dedicated liquid channels over the chips themselves. According to the company, the Flex2 system ensures stability and high performance in an overclocked state.

Patriot showcased the latest memory modules of their “Viper” series, 2GB DDR3 modules that can run at 2000MHz with latencies of 8-8-8-20. These modules operate at a relatively high voltage of 2.15V, but the company is not concerned, saying the modules were specifically designed and tested to withstand extreme operating environments. Patriot also demonstrated its new active two fan cooling system, designed to further boost their products’ overclocking capabilities.