It’s been awhile since I last did any review, so here’s one on a neat little device I picked up recently. This is the Buffalo Ministation Pro TurboUSB 500GB Portable Hard Disk. The Ministation TurboUSB was actually my last pick of the lot when I initially set out to look for a portable hard disk. The other storage devices I was considering included the Seagate Freeagent Go, Transcend StoreJet 25M, Toshiba Portable External Hard Disk Drive, and the Western Digital My Passort Essential. My initial dislike of the Ministation TurboUSB was due to its thickness and weight, which at 23mm and 225g was the thickest and heaviest of all the portable drives I had in mind. I then realized the thickness was due to its anti-shock protection design, as the drive itself is suspended in a shock-absorbent inner floating structure within the case, great for butter fingers like me! And although it was the heaviest device on paper, when I did a comparison by holding all the devices in my hand, I hardly noticed any significant weight difference. After all, we’re only talking about 20-40g differences between all the units here.
The Transcend StoreJet 25M and Toshiba units came with anti-shock protection as well, but the Toshiba was more expensive and I didn’t see a point in paying extra for the same amount of drive space. The Western Digital Passport Studio II came with a Firewire 800 interface which means it’ll have much faster transfer rates than the Buffalo Ministation’s USB 2.0 interface, but again that meant the WD Passport was much more expensive and I don’t think I’ll be doing nearly frequent enough transfers to justify that price difference. The feature which pretty much convinced me that the Buffalo Ministation should be the pick of the bunch was its very clever way of keeping the USB cable neat and tidy. If you look at the first picture I posted, you’ll notice that the cable can actually be securely wrapped around the unit itself for storage. I thought it was a simple but brilliant idea, and since I can’t stand messy cables this was an absolute Godsend!
The unit also comes with AES 128-bit encryption which is available by default without having to install any additional software. This means that the drive will automatically encrypt data so they remain safe if the disk is lost or stolen.
However, the TurboUSB feature which was supposed to be a selling point of this device really didn’t make much of a difference for me. I didn’t notice any significantly faster transfer rates with TurboUSB. But I ain’t complaining as long as it’s not slower! Couple all the above mentioned points with an attractive price and the Buffalo Ministation TurboUSB became my pick of the bunch and so far, I’m pretty happy with it.
Update: The Ministation’s Secure Lock Ware data encryption utility as well as the Memeo backup utility do not work with Ubuntu Linux, or other flavors of Linux. If you’re a Linux user and would like the data on your Ministation to be encrypted, use TrueCrypt instead. It’s open-source and is compatible with Windows, Mac, and Linux. I use it on my Ministation and it works flawlessly.
I’m one of those who pretty much skipped the whole Windows Vista bandwagon and still happily running Windows XP (and Ubuntu) on my PCs. But it’s time for me to seriously consider upgrading my Windows machines to Windows 7 after coming across all the favorable reviews. However, as some of you might already know, it’s not possible to do an upgrade due to the significant changes within the operating system kernel, the Registry, as well as drivers between XP and Windows 7.
An article on PC World gave me a little hope though. Apparently, XP users can upgrade from XP to Windows 7 by first upgrading to Vista, followed by a Vista to Windows 7 upgrade. Best of all, it’s not even necessary to have a licensed Vista since it’s only used for a short period (assuming you upgrade to Windows 7 within 30 days).
So I’m wondering if I should do this, or just perform a fresh install of Windows 7 instead? Decisions decisions…
This here is probably one of the best, if not the best iPhone App I’ve seen to date. The fact that you can’t buy it just yet doesn’t make it any less amazing. Appirion, a German company which makes various iPhone apps created the iDriver to control a car remotely using, yep you guessed it, an iPhone. The steering is remotely controlled using the phone’s accelerometer (what ingenuity!) and the acceleration and braking is controlled via two buttons on the phone’s touch screen. Just watch the clip and pick your jaw up from the floor when you’re done.
The folks at iRobot (yup, the ones who designed those “smart” automated circular vacuum thingies) are hard at work developing a morphing or shape-shifting robot using what they term as “jamming skin enabled locomotion”. I believe the video below would do a better job than me in explaining how all this works. You need to watch it, I think it’s a very interesting and smart concept which has far-reaching applications.
The video suddenly reminded me of The Terminator - The Sarah Connor Chronicles TV series, where we got to see how the “brains” of the Terminator robot started from an AI program developed for a chess game. Who knows, perhaps someday this shape-shifting robot using the Jamming Skin principle might prove to be a stepping stone towards developing a T-1000 to take over the world!
Popular Vocaloid character Miku Hatsune is now getting the robot treatment. This robotic version of Miku will be showcased at the CEATEC JAPAN 2009 show. I’ve only recently found out who(or what) Miku Hatsune was after trying out Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA on PSP. I thought it was a pretty decent game if you’re into music-themed games like DJ Max, Rock Band or Beatmania.
This robotic Miku seems both cute and a little scary at the same time. Maybe it’s just me, but robots with human likenesses and facial expressions always seem a little disturbing.
The newly designed Sony PS3 Slim looks pretty good to me, but as nice as the slim PS3 is, this Playstation 4 concept by Tai Chiem absolutely blows it out of the water. With it’s smooth mirror finish and simple shapes and lines, it’s a celebration of aesthetic beauty at its best. Woudln’t you agree that the black mirror finish and clear glass goes together rather nicely?
What does this concept PS4 contain you ask? Bluetooth integration, LCD screens on both the system and controller, the ability to mount the system horizontally or vertically are among it’s design features.
However, I’m doubting the usability and practicality of the controller since it seems to be missing quite a few buttons which are usually found on the top of the PS3 controller. Perhaps Tai Chiem could find a way to incorporate the missing buttons and try and sell the refined design to Sony. I’m sure most of us wouldn’t mind if our game consoles looked this good, even if it means having to clean it more often due to the mirror-like finish which attracts fingerprints like bees to honey.
But alas, this thing remains a concept and we can only hope that someday our future gaming devices would look this good.
If you enjoyed the Terminator: Salvation movie and can’t get enough of all things Terminator related, here’s an exclusive item to add to your list of must-haves. This 2GB USB flash drive from Solid Alliance has red Swarovski rhinestones for eyes to give it a menacing look (and crazy price tag). At 15,000 YEN ($160) for 2GB worth of capacity is by no means cheap, but that’s what you’ll have to pay for exclusivity as these are supposedly being produced in very limited numbers. It’s for sale only in Japan but if you really want one, GEEKSTUFF4U apparently will be stocking some in September for us not living in the land of cool gadgets.
XBox-Scene.com forum member Bandit5317 has recently created the smallest and slimmest XBox to date. This miniscule black box has a dimension of only 23.5 x 21.65 x 2.5 cm! Pretty mean feat, considering he managed to squeeze in a 320 GB 2.5″ HDD in that tiny little box as well. Very well done. Hit the jump for more information on how he did it.
I had no idea who (or what) Rilakkuma was up until I came across this uber cute netbook. I did a quick Google, and found out that Rilakumma is a Japanese character produced by the San-X company. This too-cute netbook is available for sale until 31st August and features 1GB RAM, an Intel Atom N270 (1.60 GHz) processor, Windows XP, and 5 hours of battery life. It also comes with its very own adorable yellow carrying case, and has built-n Rilakkuma-themed wallpapers, icons, and screensavers among other things. Click here for the product page.
I like looking at these things which reportedly cost a fortune to own. No, I probably will never be able to afford one in this lifetime, but it’s nice to be able to admire things which are perfect representations of the symbol of excess. This is the 88m (290-ft.) Maltese Falcon superyacht. It’s admittedly the world’s largest and most expensive privately-owned superyacht. It has apparently been sold for $100 million. *Somehow that $2000 1/2-Scale Sideshow Iron-Man Maquette that I’ve been thinking about doesn’t seem all that expesive afterall* This marvel of engineering design was built by Perini Navi for American venture capitalist Tom Perkins.
The bridge of the yacht looks exactly like something that came out of Star Trek. I can almost imagine Captain Piccard right there on the controls. So this is how the uber rich live. *Whacks self back to reality*
Couple all the above mentioned points with an attractive price and the Buffalo Ministation TurboUSB became my pick of the bunch and so far, I’m pretty happy with it.
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