LaCie Takes External Drives to the Next Level With the Sphere

LaCie has done it again.  At CES the company has announced the launch of three new products all of which are impeccably designed.  In a day where computing peripherals are seen as an after-thought LaCie has shown once again why people love their products–great design, speed, and elegance.

LaCie Sphere

Last year, LaCie announced a limited-edition hard drive created in partnership with designer Philippe Starck called the Blade Runner. And now for 2014, it’s introducing a new Christofle-designed hard drive, the 1TB LaCie Sphere. Plated in silver and polished to a shine, the Sphere resembles a more high-end Nexus Q. At the bottom, a single USB 3.0 cable connects and powers the hard drive, with a blue status light set into the base.  It’s shiny for sure, but like many LaCie products it comes with a premium price tag, the Sphere will launch later this quarter for $490.

LaCie Fuel

The Fuel allows you to add 1TB of untethered external storage capacity to the iPad, iPhone, Mac, and other compatible mobile devices which can be shared with up to five devices at a time. The drive is even compatible with AirPlay so you can stream movies onto your TV via Apple TV or stream music to AirPlay compatible speakers.

The LaCie Fuel creates its own Wi–Fi network, much like a router, so other devices can connect directly to it without the need for Internet access. In addition, the LaCie Fuel even acts as a hotspot when connected to the Internet via Wi–Fi. It retails for $200.

LaCie Little Big Disk Thunderbolt 2

LaCie’s latest “Little Big Disk” sports Thunderbolt 2 making it extremely fast with read speeds clocking in at 1,375MB/s. The product is powered by a set of 500GB PCIe Gen 2 SSDs in RAID 0 for excellent performance, perfect for editing 4K or 3D video. The drive will be available in Q1 2014, no price has yet been announced.