Toshiba America Electronic Components (TAEC), Storage Device Division (SDD) today announced the upgrade of its industry leading slim-line combination CD-RW/DVD-ROM product and the introduction of DVD-ROM drives with DVD-RAM media read capabilities. These new optical introductions are designed to meet the array of consumer and business storage applications required for today's multimedia computing environment.

Toshiba was the first storage supplier to introduce a slim-line combination CD-RW/DVD-ROM product, which is now available with a fast-writing speed of 8X for CD-R/CD-RW when high-speed CD-RW media is used and 8X read for DVD-ROM. With the addition of DVD-RAM media read to its line of DVD-ROM drives, Toshiba is providing its customers with drives that read multiple DVD media types to best meet the needs of the mobile computer user.

Toshiba's DVD-ROM with DVD-RAM media read drives enable the business user to access large DVD-RAM back-up files on their mobile systems, while the slim combination drive creates the benefits of both rewritable CD and the ability to read DVD media in a mobile environment. Given the space constraints in a notebook computer, the combination drive provides a cost-effective option to write and share CD files, while also allowing users to enjoy DVD movies or access large DVD data files and resource software.

The SD-R2102 slim-line combination drive begins shipping in August. The SD-C2512 slim-line DVD-ROM with DVD-RAM media read is currently available in volume production to mobile PC manufacturers.