SlashGear Japan
One thing I really appreciate is when companies are obviously reading blogs and actively answering questions – here’s just one such occasion. Last week SlashGear wrote about Ultra Products’ Stackable Peripherals, a space-saving design which lets you build secure towers of external USB hubs, hard-drives, card-readers and the like; we also questioned the method of interconnecting each item. Well, Ted Miller from Ultra Products’ PR people got in touch to show us this:
Basically, each item comes with a short USB cable to daisy-chain all of them together – then you have one single cable to go to the host PC. Similarly, the power-supply has a single power-pack and a number of short supply cables to go to each unit.
It’s certainly a far better solution than everything having its own power and data cable, yes, but I still think Ultra Products could refine it. In an ideal set-up I envisaged power and data being plugs and sockets built into the feet and top-surface of each unit, so that you could simply click them together like Lego bricks and not only would they be structurally sound but connected and powered as well. Then you’d only have two cords coming out of the back of the tower, not all those short USB and power interconnects.
What do you think, guys, perhaps an idea for the second generation?
2 Responses to “Ultra Products’ Stacking Peripherals – Interconnect Update”
chue October 23, 2006
i like the idea of everything pluggin into one central piece. you don’t have to deal with all those wire going into the electrical sockets and USB ports. now the question is, where do you get the top USB hub and the bottom PS hub?
NeutralChris Davies October 24, 2006
[quote comment="4587"]now the question is, where do you get the top USB hub and the bottom PS hub?[/quote]
Ultra Products tell me that you’ll be able to get the power supply and USB hub next month, as well as an eSATA/USB hard drive enclosure and USB Hub/Card Reader.
Neutral