It took them awhile, but drive makers are finally getting hip to the fact that we would like to see how much disk space is left without having to plug it in. About time. Western Digital’s My Book Elite and My Book Studio drives now feature labels on the outside displaying that always-on info.

That means even when it isn’t plugged in, you’ll get a 12 character label, and a second line that displays how much space is left on the disc. In both gigabytes and a graph no less. Simple solution huh? The USB 2TB My Book Elite is $280, and the 2TB My Book Studio with FireWire 800 and USB connectivity is $300.

The new LaCie Starck drives are super sexy and look like melting chrome. Has storage ever been this sensuous? They were designed by Philippe Starck. The pair come in the form of the LaCie Starck Mobile Hard Drive and Desktop Hard Drive.

Some features include an LED indicator in the shape of Starck’s sign that is projected onto the table, and the fact that the surface is touch sensitive, so you can assign actions to different kinds of touch. For instance, a tap will trigger the launch of an application, while a caress can start an automatic backup.

Some call it soccer, others call it football. Some just know it as that sport they played once that got them kicked in the groin. Whatever you call it in your country, it’s a little known fact that the heads of these athletes are removable and store data.

How do you think they come up with their game plan in the locker room? Did you think the coach simply talks to them while pointing a stick at a chalkboard? No, that would be silly. Instead, each 1 GB player removes his head and plugs himself into a port, becoming part of the team “collective” and downloading game plans. Their endgame? World domination with Pele as their new God.

Hot on the heels of their BlackArmor line upgrade, Seagate has updated their FreeAgent drives for the Mac with new features and improved performance. First there’s the FreeAgent Go Pro for Mac, a 2.5-inch external drive that features a FireWire 800 interface and FireWire 400 and USB interface. It will be available later this month in 250GB, 320GB and 500GB sizes and will cost $130, $150 and $190 each.

The other addition to the line up today is the Go Dock+, a USB hub with 3 ports, which is available now for $40.

Seagate has been busy lately. They’ve just updated their BlackArmor line with three new units, a 220 NAS that holds up to 4TB, a WS 100 external drive with eSATA and USB 2.0, and a PS 110 portable drive that holds up to 500GB.

The Seagate BlackArmor NAS 220 is available in late July for $449.99 for 2TB and $699.99 for 4TB. The Seagate BlackArmor WS 110 is available now at $159.99 for 1TB and $309.99 for 2TB. The Seagate BlackArmor PS 110 is also available now for $159.99 for 500GB.

How we wish that Nintendo would get it together and offer these 4GB drives officially. Sigh. But at least they’re available on Etsy for $55 each. The Mario Brick comes in six feet varieties and costs only $19. There’s also Koopa, Goomba and the mushroom.

Sure, it’s a hefty price, but where else are you going to get one? Plus they are hand crafted with love and star-power, in a small cottage within the Mushroom Kingdom.

SanDisk has made their latest SSDs available for purchase. The pSSD P2 and S2 both use nCache technology, which boosts random write speeds up to five times over standard hard drives. The new tech is non-volatile and should reduce the times the SSD stalls out or glitches.

These drives are built for performance, with speeds equivalent to a 9,000 RPM HDD and they are small too, so they are perfect for netbooks. It will also withstand extreme temperatures and is shockproof.

Say what you want about the folks at LaCie, they do not stand still. They just keep upping the storage at an alarming rate. The company has announced product upgrades for the 2big Network and 5big Network devices, featuring Apple Time Machine.

The 5big device even has iTunes server support. The 5big also features five hot-swappable drive bays for up to 10TB of storage for a $799.99 MSRP. The 2big device features a ho-hum 4TB of RAID at an MSRP of $319.99.

Designed by Alissia Melka-Teichroew for AMT Studio, these vintage looking skeleton key USB drives go perfectly with your steampunk PC. They are ceramic encased memory sticks made to look like old Victorian era keys.

They hold either 2GB or 4GB. As well as using them with all your steampunk computers, they also add some style to your modern computer as well. Pretty clever idea.

Remember those key-like USB keys we showed you from LaCie earlier this month? The ones that were all like, hey I’m a key, put me on your key ring. The drives are now priced and available for shipment.

Designed by 5.5 Designers, the itsaKey, iamaKey and PassKey USB drives are now available for order and ready to be lost along with your car keys. The first two sport up to 8GB of internal capacity and the PassKey boasts a built-in microSD card slot.

Following up on their CurrenKey ultraportable flash drives, Lacie has a new storage solution that will have you losing even more keys then you already do. This one takes the form factor of…keys.

These miniature microSD card readers offer 20MB/s read and 10MB/s write speeds. PassKey supports microSDHC cards, and both iamaKey and itsaKey are avaialable with 4GB or 8GB of built-in storage. It won’t start your car or get you into your home, but it may still scratch a lottery ticket and they are shock-proof and Windows ReadyBoost-compatible.

A good way to sell drives is to repackage them with preloaded special edition movies or music content. That’s what Sony is doing with their Microvault USB flash drives. The company has unveiled a number of movie titles that will be available in their MicroVault USB drives, as well as some music.

Microvault drives range from 1GB to 16GB storage capacities. Preloaded content is available from a few popular choices such as Thriller: 25th Anniversary Edition, The Da Vinci Code and Men in Black. The special edition Thriller includes the complete re-release version of the original 1982 album, seven bonus tracks and four Billie jean videos.

If you’re going for the look of a bullet entering your laptop, this USB drive is perfect. It’s a series of awesome looking flash drives that are a collaboration between Crooks & Castles and Hellz with branding & strategic consulting firm Mojo Laboratories.

The drives have 1GB of storage capacity and come loaded with storage instead of gunpowder. These aren’t armor piercing, they’re laptop and USB port piercing. One word of warning, if your job requires you to have bullets lying around, don’t get confused and grab the wrong ones.

When you think about the French, chances are you think comedy involving mimes and baguettes dancing with their comedy god Jerry Lewis. Is that just me? Alright then. The French are doing something interesting with USB and trains. A kind of wireless easy-pass for trains. French public transportation company SNCF is getting 1,000 customers to help it test an RFID-enabled smart card that doubles as a USB drive, known as the Weneo ID Smart.

SNCF wants to expand its contactless payment system, and the plan would allow customers to plug their train passes into their PC at home. Which makes sense, because at home they can add money to their account, avoid missing trains because the train is pulling away as they rush to put money onto a card, and it probably helps with crowds as well. Schedules can also be downloaded to the card and it’s a photo ID. Once on the train, the fare would be deducted from the card by an RFID reader or an attendant with a handheld device. They’ll have to see if it’s a success first, but if so, the SNCF may want everyone using the system by 2010.

Could we really not come up with a better way to violate these animals via USB? Apparently not, and I have no better suggestions to offer as far as the placement of their uh, receptacle. Poor guys get no respect at all. Just living out USB life day after horrible day, like a having perpetual proctology exam as time slides toward infinity.

You can thank Japanese company Marubeni InfoTech. This is their line of wooden USB drives. Each features a 1GB storage capacity and you get five animals to choose from: dog, pig, elephant, hippopotamus and a swan, available in maple or walnut. They’ll cost you $73. Is there an organization for the ethical treatment of wood animals?