Western Digital has introduced a new series of external hard disk drives that consists of the My Passport Essential portable hard drive, My Passport Essential SE portable hard drive and My Book Essential external hard drive. These storage devices are available in a wide variety of storage capacities and provide superfast USB 3.0 connectivity. The My Passport Essential is the smallest model and comes in a 500GB storage capacity, while the My Passport Essential SE is available in 750GB and 1TB of storage capacities. The My Book Essential provides high-capacity storage ranging from 1TB up to a massive 3TB. The My Passport Essential portable retails for $99.99, while the My Passport Essential SE drives range from $129.99 to $169.99, and the My Book Essential drives range from $129.99 to $249.99. Read more
Western Digital has released their latest media player in the form of the WD Elements Play. The device comes equipped with a built-in hard disk drive and is designed for value conscious movie buffs, who want to store and play their media collection in full-HD 1080p on their TV. Available in 1TB or 2TB of storage capacity, the Western Digital Elements Play supports AAC, MP3, JPEG, Real Media, H.264, and MKV file formats. Word has it that the Western Digital Elements Play will retail for around $200. Stay tuned for more updates. [Western Digital]
Best Buy has started selling the Limited Edition Western Digital 500GB My Passport Essential. Designed by students at California State University, Long Beach’s Industrial Design program, the portable hard drive is currently available in Boom Box, Black Hole, Cityscape, Fuchsia Leaf and Wave. These decorative patterns are especially geared for students who want to express their individual style while choosing a reliable, ultra-portable place to store their media and back up their valuable work. The Western Digital 500GB My Passport Essential comes bundled with WD SmartWare software, which provides a simple, visual method for backup using a single-screen view of the drive’s contents. Additionally, these portable HDDs also feature user-selected password protection combined with 256-bit hardware-based encryption. The Limited Edition Western Digital 500GB My Passport Essential is now available exclusively at Best Buy for $119.99. [Press Release]
If Apple TV just isn’t your thing then there is a handful of other options out there for you that are big players in the game too. One of those would be Western Digital and their new TV Live Plus HD Media Player was just released which could do a whole lot to enhance your entertainment center. It makes Netflix streaming super easy and also lets you stream content from YouTube, Flickr, Pandora, Live365 and the MediaFly network. It also lets you stream content from your networked computers and laptops as well. [GearLog]
Western Digital today rolled out the high-end external My Book Studio LX drive. Designed for Mac users, the drive comes with an aluminum casing that complements any iMac, G5 or MacBook Pro. The My Book Studio LX supports a FireWire 800 port, the pre-formatted HFS+ Journaled file system, a USB 2.0 port and a 256-bit hardware encryption to safeguard your data. Available in 1TB or 2TB of storage space, the Western Digital My Book Studio LX are priced at $200 and $270, respectively. [Press Release]
Western Digital has introduced a new line of SATA 6.0 Gbps hard drives namely the Caviar Blue. Coming in 320GB, 500GB and 640GB capacities, these 3.5-inch drives feature a SATA 6.0 Gbps interface, a 32MB of cache memory and offer a working speed of 7200 RPM. Unfortunately, there’s no info on pricing and release date yet. [Western Digital]
Western Digital has added two new storage capacities to its VelociRaptor hard drives series by launching the 450GB and 600GB models. Coming in both 2.5-inch and 3.5-inch (with built-in heat sink) form factors, these hard drives offer a working speed of 10,000 RPM, a SATA 6.0 Gbps interface, a 32MB of cache memory and a MTBF of 1.4 million hours. The 450GB and 600GB models are now available for purchase via Western Digital’s online store for $299 and $329, respectively. [Press Release]
Newegg has started selling the new Western Digital Scorpion Blue WD7500BPVT HDD for laptop. Priced at $119.99 each, this 2.5-inch HDD is currently available in 750GB of storage space, which is the highest on this form factor. The WD Scorpion Blue WD7500BPVT has a 2-platter 9.5mm high HDD with SATA 3GB/s interface, a 5400rpm spin rate, and an 8MB of cache. Additionally, the HDD also adopts the Advanced Format Technology. [Newegg]
Western Digital has entered the 750GB laptop HDD market by debuting the WD Scorpio Blue 750GB hard drive. This slim 2.5-inch SATA hard drive utilizes the company’s leading 375GB-per-platter areal density and the Advanced Format technology, allowing it to fit into the typical 9.5mm height used by most notebooks. What’s more, this storage device also sports 8MB of cache. The WD Scorpio Blue 750GB hard drive retails for $149 with a three-year limited warranty. [Press Release]
The Western Digital AV-25 (WD3200BUDT) 2.5-inch SATA hard drive is specially engineered to provide cool quiet operation and maximum reliability in always-on environments. These hard drives are perfect for DVRs, digital video surveillance and other demanding multimedia applications. The Western Digital AV-25 hard drive is offered in capacities of 160GB, 250GB, 320GB and 500GB with price ranging between $50 to $80. [Western Digital]
