July 3 - 9:20am EDT   Demand for notebook hard drives should lead to a shortage of disks throughout much of the summer, integrated circuit producers GMI Technology and Weikeng Industrial warned on Friday. As sales agents for hard drives from Hitachi, Toshiba and Western Digital, they tell DigiTimes that their clients hadn't anticipated demand and didn't adjust until it was too late. Hitachi and Western Digital were fiscally conservative due to the economy and didn't expand until early spring, while Toshiba is simply seeing very high demand for a single-platter 250GB drive. [full story]

May 27 - 10:45am EDT   Hitachi on Wednesday leapt back into North American TVs with its LCD lineup for 2009. The UltraVision models headline the series and all have 1080p images with 120Hz panels. Certain models have as many as five HDMI inputs. Hitachi produces the higher-end sets in 42-inch (L42S503), 46-inch (L46S603) and 55-inch (L55S603) versions; the smallest set ships first, appearing in June for $999, while the 46-inch TV shows in August for $1,299 and the 55-inch in September for $1,799. [full story]

May 25 - 10:05am EDT   KDDI unveiled its summer 2009 roster of phones and headlined it with one of the most advanced video-capable phones available. The Hitachi Hi-Vision Cam Wooo has a 5-megapixel camera capable of not only playing but shooting 720p video with true 3X optical zoom, autofocus and image stabilization. It records at a relatively high 9Mbps bitrate and can handle up to an hour of continuous shooting. An HDMI output similarly provides full-resolutino viewing, and a microSDHC slot provides the bulk of storage: an 8GB card can take 2 hours of video at maximum quality. [full story]

May 22 - 10:25am EDT   A leak today has revealed that Hitachi is planning the imminent launch of only the second phone to record HD video after Samsung's Omnia HD. Named in the brochure as the Hi-Vision Cam Wooo, the thin swivel phone found by Engadget would have a 5-megapixel camera capable of recording 720p video along with face detection. It would also get HDMI video output and a microSDHC slot that, with an 8GB card, could hold 2 hours of footage. [full story]

April 27 - 12:05pm EDT   Semiconductor giants NEC and Renesas today said they would merge in a deal likely to change the electronics industry. The two plan to finish talks by July that would create a single company by next April. Such a deal would give them roughly $13 billion in combined yearly sales and would make it the single-largest Japanese company building processing technology. [full story]

April 9 - 11:55am EDT   Hitachi Japan recently announced the upcoming release of no less than 11 new HDTV models in two series, including four LCDs in the Wooo UT800 series as well as four plasmas and three LCDs in the Wooo 03 range. The ultra-thin UT800 LCDs are all about 1.4 inches thick and all sport 1080p resolutions. Their thin profile is achieved thanks to the use of Ultra Wideband wireless tuner boxes, called Wooo Stations, that sit away from the HDTVs. Apart from dual tuners, the Wooo Stations also house a 250GB hard disk drive, an iVDR-S slot for removable DVR recordings and an SDHC memory card slot. They are available in 32-, 37-, 42- and 47-inch sizes. [full story]

March 27 - 4:15pm EDT   Hitachi on Friday announced the upcoming release of a new 3LCD projector aimed at the educational market, the CP-X2010, which sports a 2,200-lumens brightness rating along with a 500:1 contrast ratio. Native resolution is set at 1024x768, with lamp life rated at 5,000 hours in Eco Mode or 3,000 hours in standard mode. CP-X2010's built-in speakers provide 16W of output, and for the hearing impaired or really loud environments, closed captioning functionality is integrated. [full story]

March 24 - 4:50pm EDT   Hitachi on Tuesday announced it will soon begin shipping a new internal hard drive, the Ultrastar C10K, which has an emphasis on low energy consumption as it consumes just 3.4W at idle and 6.1W while operational; the drive as a whole uses 65 percent less power overall. The fast drives, available in 147GB and 300GB capacities, sport a 6Gbps SAS interface, 64MB buffer memory and 10,000rpm disk speeds. Both versions are deemed suitable for home office use, as they emit just 29dB of noise. [full story]

March 19 - 11:00am EDT   For the first time in company history, Sony will freeze the wages of its workers in Japan in an effort to cut operating losses and keep a lid on costs, according to a Financial Times report on Thursday. At the same time, the company will cut average bonuses, with factory workers getting a 53 percent smaller bonuses, down from the equivalent of about $23,400, that in itself is expected to save Sony about $105 million in 2009 compared to last year. The move would let Sony take active steps to keep costs in check without cutting more permanent jobs in its home country. [full story]

March 16 - 4:10pm EDT   Hitachi turn around involves new president, company split Hitachi on Monday announced it has named a new president to head up the company's turnaround plan to return to profitability. According to Monday WSJ report, Takashi Kawamura, a 47-year senior at the company who is 69, will replace Kazuo Furukawa in April. At the same time, the company will split up its automotive supply and consumer television operations. About two months ago, Hitachi announced the biggest loss ever among Japanese manufacturing companies and is expected to post a 700 billion yen ($7.1 billion) loss for the year at the end of March. The loss-making businesses will be made into wholly-owned ... [full story]

March 10 - 2:55pm EDT   Hitachi this afternoon said it had pled guilty to rigging the prices of its LCD panels and agreed to pay a $31 million fine. The agreement with a US District Court in San Francisco finds that Hitachi held meetings with Dell that illegally set prices for computer LCD displays by agreeing to prices in advance and artificially adjusting the actual quoted prices to match the target. Hitachi's move effectively let the company set its own prices independently of the market between April 2001 and March 2004. [full story]

February 26 - 5:30pm EST   Other World Computing has released a number of new Voyager hard-drive docking bundles, with storage capacities up to 2.0TB and dual-interface or quad-interface options. The external Voyager S2 features USB 2.0 and eSATA connection options, with support for both Windows and Mac systems. Customers can choose between a 500GB or 1.0TB Hitachi Deskstar drive, 1.5TB Seagate Barracuda drive, or a 2.0TB Western Digital Caviar Green drive. [full story]

February 26 - 4:25pm EST   LG may be the next to discard plasma TVs, company vice president Lee Gyu-hong says. The executive has told Kyodo News that a sustained poor world economy would make it unprofitable to keep developing and selling the more expensive display technology. If no recovery seems likely, Lee estimates that plans to exit plasma would be made public before the end of the year. [full story]

February 24 - 7:00am EST   Hitachi GST today has announced it will be acquiring Fabrik, a privately-held supplier of personal and professional storage devices. As a result of the integration, Fabrik will remain intact and work as the core of Hitachi GST’s newly-formed external storage business. In addition, Hitachi will also be offering full support of Fabrik’s G-Technology and SimpleTech storage brands. According to President of Hitachi Steve Miligan, the combination of the two companies will expand their market reach and bolster their combined product range. [full story]

February 5 - 4:15pm EST   Hitachi on Wednesday announced the upcoming release of the CinemaStar C5K500 2.5-inch hard drive available in capacities up to 500GB that sports a halogen-free design and low read/write power consumption which, at 1.4W, represents a 22 percent reduction than the older drives. The small form-factor drive is meant for use in DVRs, set-top boxes and video surveillance systems. The 160GB, 250GB, 320GB and 500GB drives feature 5,400RPM speeds. [full story]