HP launches Personal Media Drive

In conjunction with some new Media Center PCs, HP this week launched a new device -- the HP Personal Media Drive -- which lets users add up to 160G bytes of storage space to a Media Center PC without having to open up the PC case or even turn the PC on or off. For users without a Media Center PC, the Personal Media Drive can be connected as an external hard drive via USB 2.0.

The Media Drive docking bay will be available in configure-to-order Media Center PCs and in a Compaq Presario model that HP will announce later this month, the company said.

The Media Center m1000 series Photosmart PC is one of the first devices to include the Media Drive bay. The m1000 includes support for xD flash memory cards as part of its 9-in-1 media card reader that is on the front chassis. The m1000 now includes a camera docking area on the top of the chassis, letting users attach an HP digital camera and download videos and pictures to the hard drive without having to attach or re-attach camera cables. For users without a docking station, the top of the case acts as a storage space for users to store their camera, cell phone, CDs or DVDS.

The m1000 comes with a choice of processors, including Pentium 4 520, 540, 550 and 560 with Hyper-Threading Technology; 512M bytes of PC3200 DDR memory or 1G bytes of PC3200 DDR; a choice of 160, 200 or 250G-byte internal hard drive Serial ATA and an 80G-, 160G-, 200G- or 250G-byte parallel ATA internal drives; a choice of 128M-byte or 256M-byte PCI-Express or 128M-byte or 256M-byte AGP graphics card; six USB 2.0 ports and two FireWire (IEEE 1394) ports; 10/100 Ethernet; TV/FM tuner card; Windows XP Media Center Edition 2004; and HP Image Zone Plus software.

Pre-configured Media Center m1000s will start at $1,049 (after rebates); configurable models will start at $899 (after rebates). The HP Personal Media Drive will cost about $220, HP said. For configure-to-order models, go to the HP Shopping Web site. Pre-configured models are expected to be available on July 18; configure-to-order models can be purchased now.