USB Server Adds Devices to Your LAN
Two USB servers can add ports to your LAN without the need for a PC connection.
Want to share a USB device but don't necessarily want to plug it into one PC? Perhaps you have an external USB hard drive that needs to be accessed by several computers at once. Sharkoon may have the device you need, offering the new USB LANPort device that adds USB support to a LAN.
Sharkoon offers the USB server two flavors: the USB LANPort 100 providing one additional USB connection, and the USB LANPort 400 offering four ports of USB fun. Despite all the USB 3.0 talk circulating the news, both units only provide USB 2.0 connections, so no SuperSpeed data transfers until Sharkoon churns out advanced models.
"With the USB LANPorts we introduce a simple yet effective way to integrate USB devices into local area networks," the company said. "Therefore the respective USB LANPort is connected to the LAN using a patch cable and the included software is installed. Afterwards any USB devices such as printers, external HDDs, USB sticks etc. can be connected to the USB LANPort and may be accessed from the local network."
Sharkoon's two USB servers are expected to hit Germany and the rest of Europe soon for 23 Euro ($35) and 37 Euro ($56). The company has not yet released details of a North American distribution, although they may become available via Tech Data soon.
- Deals: Post Black Friday, Cyber Monday Edition
- Microsoft Finally Pushing IE6 Users to Upgrade
- Microsoft 'Investigating' Black Screen of Death
- Nokia Sues Samsung Over LCD Price Fixing
- Apple Trademarks 'TabletMac' -- Is it a Sign?
- ViewSonic Making Smartphone That Runs Win XP
- Torrent Site Mininova Removes Pirated Materials
- CrunchPad Tablet Killed by 'Greed and Jealousy'
- Asus Announces AMD Congo-powered Eee PC
- Microsoft: Black Screen of Death Not Our Fault
- Psystar to Pay Apple $2.7 Million in Settlement
- Report: Acer Launching Chrome OS Netbook
- Microsoft to Focus on Windows 8 Starting July '10
- Midweek Deals: Laptops, Monitors, HDTVs, Etc.
- Intel Demos Single Chip with 48 Cores
- Dirt 2 PC Demo Brings DirectX 11 Graphics
- Official: Comcast to Acquire 51% Stake in NBC
- Man Admits to Copying DVDs, Nothing Happens
Is this the first time this has been done? I can see my printer moving pretty sharpish!
There are devices from Digi (AnywhereUSB) and some belkin ones too, but this seems to be the cheapest I've seen. We use the AnywhereUSB to connect USB dongles to virtual server.
Does this device allow you to connect to each port individually? eg the AnywhereUSB has 5 ports but once a computer connects it takes all 5 ports. Would be nice to be able to connect a different PC to each port. No mention of 2003/2008 on their site
It does seem a cheap way to turn a printer into a network printer.
If it was eSATA I would be very interested...
NAS box without the PSU / CPU / RAM / etc.