3M eases work, wrist and play
3M is aiming to make life more comfortable for keyboard users with a range of gel-filled adjustable wrist rests.
The rests are available in deep blue, grey and charcoal. They are intended to reduce wrist fatigue and discomfort, and 3M claims they can reduce the risks of repetitive strain injury for regular keyboard users.
Designed to promote a neutral wrist position, the rests are made of a special gel developed at 3M's healthcare division. They support the shape of a user's wrists and encourage the reduction of stress on pressure points.
The healthcare division also developed the fabric that covers the rests.
It is a soft, non-woven material, which is intended to be gentle on the skin and avoid friction. The fabric is also heat and moisture resistant.
Carol Hurley, marketing manager at 3M Stationery & Office Supplies, said: 'Colour co-ordination has become important in offices. Our customers demanded a choice and we have responded with colours that received the most positive feedback during our recent research.'
The rests cost between #26.03 and #51.98.
Contact: 01344 858806.
Mayflex's 26-port managed Ethernet switch, the FHSW-2602A (above), provides 24 10Base-T ports, a fixed 10/100 port and a slot that will accommodate another 10/100 port or a 100Base-FX module. The switch, part of the company's Planet range of hubs and switches, costs #1,995 and is available now.
A software upgrade option will ship later in the year.
Contact: 0121 326 7557.
La Cie, formerly known as Electronique d2, has extended its range of PC-compatible storage products with a number of devices with built-in parallel interfaces (below). Included in the range are 1.2Gb and 9Gb hard drives, and removable media technologies, such as Iomega Jaz and 24-speed CD-Rom drives.
Contact: 0171 872 8000 www.lacie.com.
Yamaha has released a multiformat rewritable CD drive, the CRW4001t.
The Scsi drive costs #399 and combines CD-Rom, CD-R and CD-RW-Atapi formats.
The company has three more multifunction Scsi drives lined up for release very shortly.
Contact: 0908 366700.
IBM has announced a family of 64-bit microprocessors for workstations, servers and supercomputers. The Power 3 Risc chips, developed for Unix systems, use CMOS 7S technology and have copper wiring to boost performance.
Contact: 0171 202 3744 www.rs6000.ibm.com.
Micronics has launched a 32-bit desktop system board (above), compatible with the Intel Pentium and AMD's K5 and K6 processors. The Cyclone system board also supports other processors with MMX technology.
Contact: 01256 817 722.
Maxtor has expanded its Diamond Max series of 3.5in Enhanced IDE hard drives. The 2160 models offer capacities ranging from 2.1Gb to 8.4Gb at prices up to #399.
Contact: 00 353 1 204 1111 www.maxtor.com. iewsonic has replaced its 17GS monitor with the G771, a 17in model offering a refresh rate of 87Hz at 1,024 x 768 pixels. Maximum resolution is 1,280 x 1,024 pixels. Power saving features can reduce energy consumption to as low as 3W.
Contact: 0800 833648.
Tektronix has cut the price of its Phaser 600 solid ink colour printer to #6,995. The printer handles media up to 914mm wide.
Contact: 01626 403613
Vivitar has made colour scanning even more affordable by halving the price of the Viviscan Ultraphoto scanner to #99.99. The Ultraphoto can handle 6 x 4in prints, slides and transparencies, making it suitable for copying standard photographic prints. Vivitar has also cut #20 off the price of its VSF-300 30-bit A4 flatbed scanner, bringing it down to #99.99. That should bring a smile to even a reluctant subject's face.
Contact: 01793 526211 www.vivitar.co.uk.