Acer have outed a new line of notebooks, the Acer Aspire Ethos series, which promise slick design along with multimedia performance. Two models have been announced initially, the Acer Aspire Ethos 8943G and Aspire Ethos 5943G, with a choice of Intel Core i5 or i7 processors, 18-inch 1920 x 1080 and 15.6-inch 1366 x 768 displays respectively, and ATI Mobility Radeon HD5000 graphics.
There’s also Dolby Home Theater surround support, with 5.1 output, and in fact the Ethos 5943G manages to fit in a full five speakers on its own. Storage is up to 1.28TB (combining two 640GB HDDs) and there’s a choice of DVD or Blu-ray optical drives.
Connectivity includes WiFi, gigabit ethernet and Bluetooth 2.1, along with eSATA, USB, FireWire, HDMI and VGA, and there’s a fingerprint reader and webcam too. No word on prices or availability from the Italian launch today, but we’re guessing these will be premium machines.
We do our very best here at SlashGear to bring you the latest intelligence from the huge, and still growing world of the tech industry. But, as it stands, we’re only human, and sometimes we’re just not able to bring you every single piece of information we get our hands on. It’s unfortunate, but we also don’t want to give you any kind of sensory overload throughout the day. We realized that there were still a lot of great stories out there, so we wanted to bring them to your attention, in a nice, orderly fashion. That’s why we have the Daily Slash, where we’ll bring you a daily wrap-up of all the cool, interesting, or just plain shiny stuff we find.
Bannco Unveils the XScorch 360: The debate between which method to play video games has been going on for a very long time, as both sides bicker on what’s better: PC mouse-and-keyboard, or the console’s standard controller. Well, for a lot of PC gamers out there (and vice versa), there’s just one of those titles out there that you want to play on the console, but can’t shy away from that mouse of yours. Bannco has the answer for you: the XScorch 360. [via TG Daily]
Active Media Launches 16 and 32GB eSATA USB SSD Drive: The standard flash drive is still used quite a bit nowadays, and it’s primarily dealt with USB drives. They’re easy to use, and most PCs come with a multitude of ports to choose from. But it looks like Active Media wants to go a different route. While it may seem different to most, the truth is the methodology results in faster data transfers, which we can never shy away from. (What can we say? We transfer a lot of data.) The company has created two variants, a 16GB and 32GB model, both with USB capabilities. So, the same good ol’ USB connector, but with faster eSATA transfer rates. Win-win, if you ask us. [via Hot Hardware]
Chrysler Announces the Fiat 500 is Coming to America: No doubt, electric cars are still all the rage. People want to save money on gas, and getting a nice tax credit definitely doesn’t hurt. So, Chrysler wants to make sure that everyone knows their latest all-electric vehicle, which made a previous, limited edition run in Europe, is coming to the States in 2012. Yeah, there will be plenty of other models from different companies that release between now and then, but hey, this one is definitely easy on the eyes. [via Autoblog]
AGENT Creates Soccer Ball of the Future: We’ve been hearing a lot of talk about 3D, and how it relates to events like the Barclays Premiere League, and the FIFA World Cup ready to kick off in just a few months. But, there’s one area that seems to be neglected all the time, and we don’t mean the pitch (which is known as the field here in the States). The soccer ball. And, sure, you may look at the ball and think that there’s not much room for improvement, but, AGENT begs to differ. They’ve created a translucent ball, that lights up depending on actions occurring on the field. Yeah, we know. It’s awesome. [via Design Boom]
Old Time Computer Wants to Make You Look Rich, With Wood: Think your computer looks boring? Why not spruce it up with some wooden casing? Old Time Computer can do that for you, and it’s not as expensive as you might think, considering the workmanship and detail that goes into the project. It’s a pretty simple snap-on case though, so even if it gets heavy on the eyes at some point, you should be able to just take it right off. Getting a case for your iMac will cost you about $265, and you can change your keyboard in the same fashion as well, but that will cost you an additional $345. [via DVICE]
Active Media Products has a full line of storage devices and SSDs that use solid state storage. Some of the devices are flash drives and others are SSDs designed to be used inside computers. Active Media Products has unveiled a new flash drive that is designed to work on both eSATA and USB equipped machines.
The new flash drive offers an eSATA connector on one end and a mini USB 2.0 port on the other. The flash drive looks virtually identical to the OCZ Throttle that we talked about way back in 2008. The drive can be connected to a computer with only the USB port.
If the machine has an eSATA port, data transfer is much faster. When used as an eSATA drive the device has to be connected to a USB port for power. The mini USB port means when you use the drive with a USB port you need the included cable to use it. The drive will be offered in 16GB or 32GB with prices of $69.95 and $109.95 respectively.
Didn’t get enough of ASUS’ O!Play HD2 mediaplayer, complete with its segment-leading USB 3.0 connectivity? ARM-loving Charbax has offered up a demo video of the O!Play HD2 in action from CeBIT 2010, and while the UI may not be the most inspiring we’ve ever seen, you can’t really knock the ports ASUS have squeezed in.
Video demo after the cut
As well as the USB 3.0 – which should be handy for hooking up high-speed external drives and playing back high-resolution content from them – there’s HDMI 1.3, composite and component video, together with both optical and coaxial digital audio outputs. There’s also eSATA and various memory card reader slots, together with a network port. More details in the video below.
ASUS have quietly added a third model to their O!Play mediaplayer range, the ASUS O!Play HD2. With no information beyond a name in the CeBIT 2010 press release they’ve sent us, however, and nothing on the company site, we’re left guessing to its complete specifications, though the single photo does reveal USB, eSATA and various forms of memory card reader.
We’re presuming the O!Play HD2 is another networked media player, similar to the two models that have gone before it. That would suggest 1080p HD video output via HDMI (or composite audio/video and digital audio outputs) together with some degree of networking support, either ethernet or maybe 802.11n like the O!Play Air HDP-R3.
Still, we’re waiting to hear back from ASUS themselves as to what the mediaplayer actually delivers, and hopefully some pricing and availability news too. We’ll update when that comes in.
After Intel prematurely pulled the trigger on their Atom N470 announcement yesterday, we’ve now got official confirmation about one of the first netbooks to use the new, 1.86GHz processor. The Gigabyte TouchNote T1000 is, as the image suggests, another of the company’s convertible netbook-tablets, with a 10.1-inch 1,366 x 768 touchscreen and a choice of the N450 or N470 CPUs.
Two versions of the T1000 will be offered, the T1000X with a 4-cell, 4,500mAh battery and the T1000P with a 6-cell, 7,650mAh battery. Both netbooks will have 1GB of RAM, a 250GB HDD and Intel GMA 3150 graphics, along with WiFi b/g/n, 10/100 ethernet and Bluetooth 2.1+EDR.
Ports include two USB 2.0, an eSATA/USB combo, audio in/out, VGA, ExpressCard and a multiformat memory card reader; there’s also a 1.3-megapixel webcam, microphone and 1.5W stereo speakers. No word on pricing, but we’re guessing this won’t be an especially cheap netbook – Gigabyte will probably tell us more at CeBIT 2010 this coming week.
LaCie have unveiled a new rugged external hard-drive, and it’s apparently the first on the market with a Power eSATA port. The LaCie Rugged eSATA not only supports transfer speeds of up to 90MB/s, but – if used with a powered USB-eSATA combo connection – can hook up with a single cable.
Of course, if you don’t have a Power eSATA port on your laptop you can still use the LaCie drive. In the box there’s a Y-cable which connects to a USB and a regular eSATA socket, pulling in power from the former and using the latter for data.
LaCie have a list of compatible machines here so you can check to see if your notebook is suitable. The LaCie Rugged eSATA hard-drive is available now, priced at $159.99 for 500GB.
Press Release:
LaCie Rugged eSATA: Mobile Storage for Fast Data Transfer
Power eSATA interface allows you to work faster
Rugged casing is ideal for protecting valuable data on the go
Up to 90MB/s through Power eSATA
Compatible with standard eSATA ports
LaCie today announced the Rugged eSATA, the first mobile external hard drive on the market that features a Power eSATA interface. The Rugged eSATA offers major storage capacity and a cost advantage over eSATA SSD solutions, and is one of the only portable, bus-powered eSATA solutions on the market.
Bus-powered when connected to a USB-eSATA combo port, the LaCie Rugged eSATA combines superior transfer speeds of up to 90MB/s in a truly mobile form. The USB-eSATA combo interface, also known as Power eSATA, features a slightly different connector than eSATA and is frequently found on late-model laptops. The drive is also compatible with standard eSATA ports when the included USB power-sharing cable is connected.
“We are thrilled to integrate power eSATA technology into our best-selling Rugged mobile hard drive,” said Anne-Sophie Marchand, Consumer Product Manager. “This solution brings dazzling transfer speeds to customers on the go, while still ensuring compatibility with standard eSATA and USB 2.0 connectors.”
Housed in the award-winning Rugged casing designed by Neil Poulton, the LaCie Rugged eSATA features a unique scratch-resistant aluminum shell, internal anti-shock absorbers, and a shock-resistant rubber bumper to better protect files against everyday blunders.
Availability
The LaCie Rugged eSATA will be available in 500GB capacity through the LaCie Online Store, LaCie Reseller+ and LaCie Storage Partner starting at the suggested retail price of $159.99 (VAT included). For more information, visit www.lacie.com.
Remember Marvell’s third-gen Sheevaplug? The newest server-in-a-wall-wart made its debut at CES 2010 last month, adding WiFi and Bluetooth along with a faster, more capable chipset. As we saw before, the core Sheevaplug design often prompts some interesting third-party versions, and one such mini-server is Globalscale’s GuruPlug Server Plus. It takes the basics of the Sheevaplug and throws in an eSATA port, a second gigabit ethernet port and a microSD card slot.
It’s the more comprehensive sibling to the standard GuruPlug Server, which gets two USB 2.0 ports and a single ethernet connection, as well as no memory card slot. Both have a 1.2GHz processor with 512MB of RAM and various tinker-friendly ports.
The Globalscale GuruPlug Server Plus is available for preorder now, at $129, with deliveries expected to take place from April 2010. As for the basic GuruPlug Server, that’s $99 and will also begin shipping in April.
Back when ASUS announced their O!Play HDP-R1 media streamer in June 2009 we criticized it for leaving out WiFi. Now the company have launched a new version, and the ASUS O!Play Air HDP-R3 does indeed bring WiFi 802.11n to the table. The HDP-R3 is capable of playing back local 1080p HD content from attached memory sticks and hard-drives, as well as sucking streaming content over your high-speed wireless network.
Connectivity includes HDMI v1.3, composite audio/video and digital audio outputs, along with a USB 2.0 port and a combo USB 2.0/eSATA port for hooking up external storage. The new O!Play also has a multiformat memory card reader and wired ethernet port.
Video support is pretty comprehensive, with MPEG1/2/4, H.264, VC-1 and RM/RMVB content supported in a variety of containers (mp4, .mov, .xvid., .avi., .asf, .wmv, .mkv, .rm, .rmvb, .flv, .ts, .m2ts, .dat, .mpg, .vob, .mts, .tp, .trp, .iso); there’s also broad audio (MP3, WAV, AAC, OGG, FLAC, AIFF, LPCM, WMA, Dolby Digital, Dolby Digital Plus, DTS) and image (JPEG, BMP, PNG, GIF, TIFF) compatibility. There’s also a dedicated button on the new remote that instantly kicks the mediaplayer into shuffled music playback. The ASUS O!Play Air HDP-R3 is on sale in Italy now, priced at €129.90 ($178); no word on an international release as yet.
NAS manufacturer Synology have outed a pair of new external network drives, one for the small business crowd and another more suited to home users. The Synology DiskStation DS1010+ has five internal HDD bays and the potential for a further five with an optional expansion enclosure, while the DiskStation DS110j makes do with just one drive. Both support DLNA media streaming, gigabit ethernet connectivity and have a clutch of USB 2.0 ports for hooking up external drives or peripherals.
The DiskStation DS1010+ is based on Intel’s latest Atom dual-core D510 1.66GHz processor (in effect the nettop version of the N450), complete with up to 3GB of RAM (1GB standard), and Synology reckon it has 250-percent faster performance than its DS509+ predecessor. As well as the five onboard bays – each happy with a 3.5-inch 2TB HDD – you can pair it with the DX510 five-bay external enclosure; RAID 1, 5 or 6 setups are supported, and there are dual gigabit ethernet ports, four USB 2.0 ports and an eSATA port.
As for the DiskStation DS110j, that’s a little more homely with just a single ethernet port and three USB 2.0 ports, an 800MHz processor and 128MB of RAM. However it has similar media sharing and backup functionality to the DS1010+ (albeit with no RAID support, obviously).
Both are available in the US and Canada now, in both diskless and HDD-pre-installed forms. No word on how much the Synology DiskStation DS1010+ comes in at, but the DiskStation DS110j is $150 with no included storage.
Remember Marvell’s 
