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USB Drive

Memory specialist Crucial has launched Gizmo, the latest addition to the long list of USB-based Flash drives. Available in 64, 128 and 256MB flavours, each chewing gum pack-sized Gizmo comes with a three-foot USB extension cable, a wrist strap, lifetime guarantee and free shipping.

Prices (including UK sales tax) are £27.01/$35.99 (64MB), £41.11/$54.99 (128MB) and £68.14/$89.99 (256MB), which is only fractionally more than the cost of a no-name brand and rather less than we've seen versions like Sony's Micro Vault sold for.

Hard Disk

Despite bringing mobile-oriented hard drive speeds up to 7200rpm, Hitachi continues to offer 4200rpm units. Today it introduced a new model, the 4K80, promising that the product offers the highest performance and the lowest noise in the 4200rpm mobile HDD category.

When the 4K80 ships in volume in June, it will be available in one- and two-platter versions, with capacities of 30, 40, 60 and 80GB. Each unit is 9.5mm in height. They offer an average latency of 7.14ms and average seek time of 13ms. The drives support Ultra DMA mode 5 and ATA-6 for a 100MBps maximum data transfer rate.

Mobo

QDI has launched a line of motherboards based on Intel?s Pentium 4, 800MHz frontside bus chipset family, the 865. The family comprises three boards: the P4I865PEA, based on Intel?s 865PE, the P4I865GA (Intel 865G) and the P4I865PA (865P).

The P4I865PEA is designed for high-end desktops and features support for dual-channel DDR 400 memory, AGP 8x, Serial ATA, eight USB 2.0 ports and 1394, six-channel AC97 sound, and gigabit Ethernet. The basic model costs around £75 plus VAT in the UK. ®