Monday 24 February 2014

LaCie

(November 2013)

LaCie ha recently released the industry's first ever 5TB external hard drives. The standalone cube allows 25 terabytes of storage thanks to Seagate's new hard drives; the LaCie 5big Thnderbolt series can be paired with up to five individual 5-terabyte drives for a maximum of 25TB. It is also available in a 10TB config, but naturally the price increases with storage.

The new drives are extensions to the Lacie 5big Thunderbolt, 2big Thunderbolt and d2 Thunderbolt ranges.
As well as individual drives with(out) external casings, Lacie is using the technology in its five hard disk RAID arrays, offering up to 25TB, for all your major storage needs.

However, probably not particularly suitable for the average household owner for a number of reasons (the incredible amount of storage it can hold far surpasses that of any typical home. Not to mention the grand price of a figure just under £2k). However if it were to be for your average use, each (£279) 5B of the nifty storage device can store up to 82,000 photos.

The 5big would be more suited to large businesses and corporations looking for suitable back up hardware for frequent and large back-ups.

The target audience for the product has been assumed to be those in the video editing and photo markets.



Thursday 30 January 2014

Automatic

The automatic is a small device that plugs into a vehicles diagnostics system through its OBD-II Data Link connector. Its also have 4.0 bluetooth built in, which then transmits data wirelessly to the companion smart phone app - it identifies driving habits such as sharp breaking, speeding and excessive acceleration. This could lead to excessive fuel consumption and poor maintenance of the car itself.
As well as this, the device also enables to to find your parked car, alerts emergency services in the event of a break in and can provide a diagnostic analysis should any warning lights turn on on the dashboard.
The Automatic was released in early 2013 but has recently been given an update which allows users to turn their automatic Link hardware devices into iBeacons. These then allow users to transmit to/ receive information from other sensors or devices in the vicinity.
This new technology would be very helpful for society as it can determine the fuel consumption of the user's vehicle and thus enable them to make changes with their driving and allow for less fuel to be consumed. This therefore means that they would not have to pay as much for petrol/ diesel and saves them money; this feature would also provide service to the environment as it would be making cars/ other transport more energy efficient.

In terms of business this could help transport orientated companies such as those that make deliveries and rely on the transportation of goods to areas far away/ even nearby. Most courier services would benefit from this and would save them money on vehicle repairs and costs spent on fuel. this would also allow data to be colelcted and give feedback to members of staff that are perhaps not driving as efficiently as possible andthus costing the company money. 

automatic-reader