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MacTell has announced the immediate availability of the FirePower FireDrive line. FirePower FireDrives are external FireWire drives sure to excite any Blue and White owner. The new drives come in 8.4 GB, 10.1 GB, and 14.4 GB flavors and have all the flexibility and power that FireWire offers. According to MacTell:
The FirePower FireDrive HDD is an external hard drive incorporating all the speed and versatility of IEEE 1394, or FireWire, technology. Fully hot swappable and extremely flexible, the drive presently ships with storage capacities of 8.4, 10.1, and 14.4 GB.
Due to its rapid data transfer and vast networking potential, consumer product support for FireWire is growing rapidly and major manufactures of computer equipment and multimedia devices are adopting FireWire technology, including development of digital camcorders, DVDs, set-top boxes, and home-user audio equipment. Apple (symbol: AAPL) shipped over 450,000 FireWire equipped Power Macintosh Computers in the last quarter ending March 31, 1999.
"After witnessing performance capabilities that rival any contemporary storage solution available and knowing that Apple's road map will far exceed all I/O potential ever before imagined, what's truly impressive about FireWire is its simplicity and flexibility in networking complex chains of multimedia devices. In the future, the end-user will be able to utilize this technology to make home videos, seamlessly transfer them to a computer for editing, and play it on a VCR that night, using a single hard drive for storage. This is very exciting technology for everyone," stated Shaun Mohle, Mactell's Chief Technical Officer.
We spoke to Greg Snyder, Director of Corporate Communications, for MacTell. It was obvious from talking to him that he and MacTell are pretty excited about this new line of products. Mr. Snyder told us to expect even more from the drives when Apple releases the next update to FireWire drivers. According to Mr. Snyder:
"Although we are very excited about the performance of our new FirePower drives, you can expect to see even more remarkable performance once that update [to FireWire drivers] from Apple is released. Apple focused on flexibility with the initial release, but they have focused on performance with the next rev."
The drives have a retail price as follows: The 8.4 GB drive is priced at US$499, the 10.1 GB drive is priced at US$699, and the 14.4 GB drive is priced at US899. The drives are available from MacWarehouse, ClubMac, MacMall, MacZone, Cyberian Outpost, and BottomLine as well as from MacTell's web site.
Initial shipments are limited, so check with your favorite retailer to grab yours while you can.
[Editor's Note: MacTell is a sponsor of The Mac Observer.]
The Mac Observer Spin: There was much grumbling about Apple focusing so exclusively on FireWire with the release of the Blue and White G3s. This product from MacTell, and VST's announced FireWire drives, as well as other existing products will prove this grumbling to be for naught. FireWire removes much of the nerd knowledge required to make technologies like SCSI work smoothly all of the time. That has always been a focus for Mr. Jobs, computing for the rest of us, and FireWire is a significant step towards a future of computing for non-nerds.
The Mac Observer will be bringing you a review of this product soon.
MacTell
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