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company has developed a new technology which uses the same laser
that burns data to a disc to also burn the label.
Known
as LightScribe, the technology uses the laser to 'expose' a chemical
on one side of specially-coated discs. Once all the data has been
burned to the disc, it is simply flipped over and returned to
the tray. Using LightScribe-compatible software, the label can
then be laser etched onto the disc, with the kind of precision
and high-resolution you would expect from this kind of technology.
Unfortunately, the technology cannot be used with existing CD
or DVD burners; you will have to buy a special unit. HP is hoping
that LightScribe will become a standard component of new drives
and insists that it will only add a 'few dollars' to the price.
The company expects to begin shipping LightScribe-enabled products
in the summer. Only Windows will be supported at first with additional
OS support to follow.
NTL
Broadband
Whilst trawling around on the internet the other day I came across
some information that stated that NTL had started to upgrade the
speed of their Broadband connections. The increases in speed are
as follows.
300
k becomes 1MB
750 k becomes 2 MB
1.5 MB becomes 3 MB
These speed increases come with no increase in your monthly charges
but the amount of data you can download will be capped in the
future. All of the information I have seen suggests that a 3 GB
per month limit will be placed on the 1 MB connection and that
the faster connection will remain at 1 GB per day.
The following link will take you to the NTL online upgrade page.
http://www.ntlworld.com/data-feeds/editorial/microsites/tierMigration/cablemodem.php
If you follow the upgrade procedure you will be given the opportunity
to read the terms and conditions before you commit to the new
speeds. What is not clear is whether you will automatically be
upgrade in the future or whether you can stay at your old speed.
If you come across any updated information on these upgrades please
let us know.
PC Drive Reaches 500GB
Hitachi's new Deskstar 7K500 drive marks several milestones in
the storage industry: It's the first desktop hard drive to reach
500GB and one of the first to use the speedy new SATA II interface.
In terms of how it stores data, though, the Deskstar may be among
the last of its kind, as drive manufacturers begin to approach
the limits of how densely they can pack data using today's standard
recording technology.
Demand for greater capacity continues to rise due in large part
to a growing need for music and video storage on PCs and consumer
electronics devices. To meet that need, storage vendors are turning
to new recording technologies. The first of these, perpendicular
recording will debut from Toshiba this year.
Hitachi's 500GB drive will be available in two versions: a drive
featuring the older parallel ATA interface and an 8MB data buffer,
and a model with a 16MB buffer that uses the 3-gigabits-per-second
Serial ATA II interface (which is backward-compatible with the
1.5-gbps SATA interface).
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