Two Birds

This story appears in the April 2004 issue of Entrepreneur. Subscribe »

Wireless technologies are supposed to make business life easier, and new wireless-equipped storage gadgets are designed to do just that. The $119 (all prices street) Soyo (www.soyousa.com) Wireless Flash Combo is a small USB device that combines 802.11b Wi-Fi with 128MB of flash memory. The similar SMC Networks (www.smc.com) EZ Connect 2.4GHz 11Mbps Wireless USB Flash Drive clocks in at $69 for 32MB of storage. Both support WEP security standards. Their portability and storage capacity are a good fit for entrepreneurs who need to add wireless to a laptop. USB flash drives are becoming popular as floppy replacements, so you might as well kill two birds with one piece of hardware.

Pocket PC owners can take advantage of this convergence with SanDisk's (www.sandisk.com) Connect Plus card. For $99, you get 802.11b wireless connectivity and 128MB of storage in a CompactFlash format card. With limited expansion slots available on Pocket PCs and Wi-Fi hot spots popping up all over, the Connect Plus has arrived at the right time. Having enough storage memory is always an issue for Pocket PC users. Getting Wi-Fi and extra memory in one package is a cost-effective way to go.