Everything USB... We Mean Everything!

No stranger to the ubiquitous pointing device, Logitech boasts an impressive 20+ year history building mice and computer peripherals. Having surpassed the one billion mouse mark back in 2008, they are the undisputed leader in electronic rodent computer peripherals. New for 2009, the Logitech Anywhere MX wireless mouse combines wireless connectivity with unique "Darkfield" tracking technology for a mouse that is said to be able to track on pure glass and other highly reflective surfaces. Designed to be a fully-featured portable workhorse, the Anywhere MX also brings a rather unique scroll wheel to the party. How well does it all work in the cold, cruel world? Come to our glossy new labs to see if the Anywhere MX can track straight and true.

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MP3s killed the mod tracking star. The Novation Launchpad makes composing digital music a much more interactive and almost into an art. The 64 button 'keyboard' integrates into the Ableton Live software to help you conduct multi-track music compositions using sampling, looping and dynamic patterns in real time. Each of the 64 keys can actually have many functions controlled by the 16 other function buttons. Check out the video, once you get to know the pad you can hop between sampling, patterns and mixer functions on the fly with ease. The back-lighting system illuminates the keys along with the song. The combination of easy control and visual feedback make this a fantastic tool for both composition or live mixing.

Back in the mid 90s mod tracking was really starting to get serious. Music wanted to be free but sound compression hadn't come around and a 9600 baud modem was what most people used to connect to the Internet. Sample based music had a big following and GUI tools were starting to make it easy for just about anyone to take a stab at making serious music. Ableton's software is crazy serious about enabling serious use of its tools for these same ends. It will support up to SIX of these pads at once for instant visibility and control of your technological symphony. The software is available at about $199 for both PCs and Macs.

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Sanwa's got a new monster hub that just missed Halloween, the 400-HUB009. Sporting an almost unprecedented 12 ports, this round octopus hub should definitely be able to the handle the needs of all but the most USB addicted users out there. The hub's circular shape gives every USB port plenty of room, so that all shapes of devices can easily be plugged in. There are 10 available ports around the edge of the disc as well as 2 extra top mounted ports which are ideal for plugging flash drives in and pulling them out quickly. The hub is fed by a mini-USB type input plug and an almost mandatory power adapter. Trying to run off of bus power would be horribly ill advised.

The only problem with the hub is the 360 degree mess that you will have if you manage to fill all of the available ports. With the average cable sticking out at least 2 inches front and back this scary spider will take up about 12 inches of desk space. Still, this might make for some great niche applications and is reasonably priced at around $55 if it every makes it outside Japan.

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You say you want a revolution? There's no question that the Beatles were a revolution, changing the face of music and arguably the world in their wake. That's why it's no surprise to see a one of a kind USB drive loaded with Beatles music arrive. Apple and EMI are cooperatively releasing this Beatles inscribed, apple shaped 16GB flash drive with all 14 released LPs and 13 mini-documentary films. This is one of the very few digital distributions of the Beatles music to the public. The rights owners have been very cautious about release the fab foursome's music in soft formats to date. We hope to see more soon. The music is included in both 24-bit 44.1Khz FLAC and 320 kbps MP3 format, and has been digitally remastered prior to encoding. The drive is also packed with album art and liner notes. It probably should have been a yellow submarine drive but at least it is finally here.

Only 30,000 of these will be manufactured and they should start shipping on December 7th. You can preorder now at their online store. The drive full of yummy Beatle goodness and a tiny apple dose of vitamin-C will run you $330.

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Klipsch today evolves a new version of its computer high powered computer system speakers called the Klipsch ProMedia 2.1 Wireless iPod/Computer Speaker. This 2.1 channel sub+satellite system provides more than enough power to complement any HTPC or gaming desktop. The speaker set is fed by a USB sound card which is about the size of a normal flash drive. This dongle then wirelessly transmits sound to the base, just like the Bose SoundLink. The subwoofer distributes signal and power to the dual driver satellite speakers. The USB sound transmitter is of the plug and play variety and should work on PC and Mac systems, without drivers. The satellites have an 3.5mm input for plugging in an iPod or other media player.

The wow factor comes from the 200 watts of power housed in such a compact unit. This system makes for a perfect mate to a laptop that can't sit still or for desks with limited space. Only one cord is needed to bring massive amounts of sound to any system. The power cord runs into the subwoofer and that's it. You'll have to shell out $199 to get this into your hands and start pumping the jams. Available for order now from Klipsch's web store.

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Your wait for a uber-fast USB 3.0 flash drive is over. Super Talent RAIDDrive will be the first thumbdrive to use USB 3.0 specs; under SuperSpeed USB mode, it will deliver an impressive 200MB/s with regular legacy BOT driver and reach a jaw-dropping speed of 320MB/s when paired with a UASP driver. UASP stands for USB Attached SCSI, created to leverage transfer rate of the new interface. Oddly, UASP driver isn't included. We will have to find out why.

The company claims the RAIDDrive employes patented "multiple pairs of differential serial data lines technology" for optimal NAND performance. In comparison, the RAIDDrive is five to eight times faster than the top-of-the-line Corsair Flash Voyager GT and Pretec i-Disk Tango, both of which hover at around 35 to 40MB/s. At top speed, filling up a Super Talent's 64GB USB 3.0 flash drive would take a little over 3 minutes. The same task would take 26 minutes over a USB 2.0 port. There's no word on pricing, but expect retail availability of all three models (32GB, 64GB & 128GB) in December, the same month Asus, Gigabyte and Dane-elec will be shipping their USB 3.0 gear.

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There's more drama today around Intel's recent USB 3.0 announcement. Intel last week announced it is postponing work integrated USB 3.0 technology into its mainboards. Nvidia, extreme veteran of the video game 3D hardware arena, accused former partner Intel of stifling innovation. Not quite as biting as an accusation of unfair business practices, Nvidia claims that as Intel has quashed its abilities to enter the chipset market, Intel is now going to sit on its hands. They claim that, with the absence of any major competitors, Intel is slowing down its innovation. Looking at the timeline of competition and developments by Intel while challenged by Nvidia, you can see their point. Intel made major advances keeping up with nVidia who was trying to push its own nForce chipset. The fierce competition and market turn has led nVidia to return to its mainstay and effectively exit the motherboard chipset race.

While the pain felt by Nvidia is understandable, business is business. Competition drives innovation, and silicon behemoth isn't a charity. We do hope they will continue to innovate and we'll have to look to AMD/ATI to really bring the pain to Intel and keep prices low, features high and the bytes flying.

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Not everyone wants to deal with the complexity associated with setting up NAS and tweaking network settings just to show high-def movies on his HDTV. The easiest way to playback the media is undoubtedly a player with all the necessary HD format and USB drive support. WD TV HD is insanely popular because it works seamlessly with MKV and H.264. Now, other solutions have emerged to perfect the USB media box. Viewsonic VMP70 is one of them.

The Viewsonic VMP70 can read literally every video codec out there, including DivX/XviD, H.264, VC-1, WMV9 and RMVB. In the audio department, OGG is most welcome among anime fans; built-in DTS decoding is here for those without an amplifier; and FLAC will be appreciated by audiophiles. Unlike the WD TV HD however, the VMP70 doesn't read HFS+ so Mac fanboys can skip this one altogether. Virtually all the buttons are moved to the remote so don't lose it or the VMP70 just becomes a 1 lb. paperweight. As of this writing, Viewsonic is offering a special holiday pricing of $98.99; street price should be pretty much the same even after the promotional period.

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Keian, has released what promises to be a fun toy for the start of the gift giving season. Wireless E-Darts is a computer enhanced game of darts. The dart board is the safe kind with the dulled tips and receptacle holes that are supposed to catch the darts. These are supposed to be kid-safe but don't tend to catch the darts as well which makes scoring hard. That's where the beauty of this item comes into play. The dart board links to a USB wireless receiver and send the location of each dart strike even if it doesn't manage to stay in the board.

Besides tracking the darts, the software also keeps score with multiple players on 10 varieties of the game. There's 12 darts included with the package and about 40 replacement tips to last through some normal wear and tear. The board itself requires only 2 AA batteries and is capable of sending signals to a PC up to 30 ft. away. Software is currently only available for PC and only obtainable in Japan. If you happen to locate a grey-market exporter you can expect to pay around $140.

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