Year: 2002

SONICblue today unveiled the Rio Riot, a 20GB portable MP3 player that holds more than 5,000 songs. The Mac-compatible device features a 10 hour Lithium Ion battery, FM tuner, USB connectivity, and iTunes support. Rio Riot is currently available for preorder for US$399.95 and is expected to ship by the end of February.

LaCie today announced two new high capacity FireWire drives in capacities of 120GB and 160GB. Both drives feature transfer speeds of up to 35MB/sec, with the 120GB drive spinning at 7200 RPM and the 160GB drive operating at 5400 RPM. The drives will ship in February for US$399 and $449, respectively.

SmartDisk today unveiled its new FireLite portable FireWire hard drive, which is even smaller than the company’s VST Thin FireWire drives. The bus-powered drive will be available in February for in 20GB (US$279.95), 30GB ($349.95), and 40GB ($429.95) capacities. SmartDisk will be demonstrating the drives at booth #1544 at Macworld Expo this week.

At Macworld Expo this week, Imation (booth #425) will be demonstrating its full line of storage products, including the new FlashGO! flash media reader/writer that supports CompactFlash, Smart Media, MultiMedia Card, Secure Digital, Memory Stick, and IBM’s Microdrive. The product will ship in the first half of 2002. Additionally, the company will once again preview its DataPlay technology, which packs 500MB of removable storage into the size of a quarter.

Proxim today announced that it has added Mac-compatibility to its Skyline 802.11b USB Adapter (US$149), bringing wireless networking capabilities to any Mac with a USB port. Additionally, the company announced that it has added Mac support to its line of Symphony HomeRF networking products, an alternative 10Mbps wireless technology.