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CES 2012: Iomega Expands NAS Drive Lineup

LAS VEGAS —

Iomega will introduce two network-attached
storage (NAS) drives this week as the company
continues to shift its focus away from simple external
storage systems.

“I see 2012 as the year of network storage,” said
Marc Tanguay, Iomega’s senior product manager of
network storage solutions.

The primary reason Tanguay cited is the complexity
has been taken out of these products for the consumer.
The setup is now almost fully automated, removing
the need for the consumer to have to behave as an IT
manager, he said.

Iomega’s consumer-centric offering is the EZ Media
& Backup Center. This will ship this month in 1TB, 2TB
and 3TB capacities.

The ongoing hard-drive shortage created by the
flooding of HDD manufacturing facilities in Thailand is
forcing Iomega to hold off on finalizing pricing, and it
was not available as of press time, Tanguay said.

However, he added that Iomega has enough supply
to meet its needs.

The EZ Media allows for central
backup and storage, and users can
access the content on other computers
and portable devices via a
web app.

The NAS device is UPnP compliant,
allowing it to stream multiple
lines of HD video. Content stored
on the NAS can be viewed, via the
web, with up to 256 other devices.

In addition, content can be uploaded,
downloaded and streamed
directly to the drive using Iomega’s
Link remote app. Tanguay said that
this essentially gives the owner
terabytes of storage space for a
portable device. The data is automatically
downloaded to the drive
from a smartphone or tablet essentially
eliminating the need for cloud storage.

The drive uses Iomega’s QuikProtect software for
backup, Time Machine is used for Apple computers,
and the user can set up folders that directly
connect to their social
media sites. These will automatically
upload to the site
when the photo, music or
video is moved into that folder.

The second device is the
StorCenter ix2 and is geared
toward the prosumer/SoHo
buyer.

It is a two-bay device that
can come preloaded with
drives or diskless, allowing
the buyer to configure it as
needed. It can be set up with
1TB, 2TB, 3TB, 4TB and 6TB
drives.

For the reasons cited previously,
pricing has not been
set, but it will ship this
month.

It has the same storage
and network capability as
the EZ Media and adds the ability to work with IP security
cameras to store and show the video over the
Internet.

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