Have you been holding out on that 64GB flash drive purchase, because you want something faster than USB 2.0? Well, PQI has just the thing. The PQI Cool Drive U366 is a USB 3.0 flash drive inside of an all aluminum shell.

Since it is USB 3.0, you’ll get 5Gbps/sec maximum bandwidth and it has a read speed of up to 97MB/sec. If 64GB is more than you need, 16GB and 32GB options are also available. Soon enough, other manufacturers will be unleashing 3.0 flash drives.

You will want to get one of Brando’s new USB 3.0-to-SATA adapters which enable any SATA hard drive to be accessed externally at USB 3.0 speeds. You won’t have to carry around a dock. It’s just a simple dongle that you can take anywhere.

It plugs directly into the port side of your HDD. Of course, you’ll need a USB 3.0 capable PC or expansion card to get that extra speed boost. So how much will it cost you to start using that old drive again? Only $48.

I will be glad when USB 3.0 gear hits the market in full force. I am tired of waiting what feels like ages for my backup to complete. LaCie and Symwave have announced a new USB 3.0 dual-drive RAID solution that will be shown off at CES.

The drive is called the LaCie 2Big USB 3.0 drive and is fitted with dual discs and can operate in RAID 0/1 configuration. The drive can be had with up to 4TB of storage and will ship with backup software for Windows and Mac computers.

StarTech has unveiled its USB 3.0 ExpressCard which features a couple of ports to get you all started with USB 3.0. But there are a few problems though. These SuperSpeed USB ports won’t have the juice to supply a full 900mA for each port.

And an optional AC adapter will be needed which adds up to more stuff to carry. The dongle itself is too vulnerable also. When laptops are dropped and land on the side of the ExpressCard, it will instantly break. At $50, you might want to think twice on this one.

Buffalo’s DriveStation HD-HXU3 is the first external USB 3.0 drive to hit the U.S. It promises to deliver transfer speeds up to 4.8Gbps and Buffalo has a two-port USB 3.0 PCI Express card to get you going.

There’s no info on price yet on the USB 3.0 PCI Express card (IFC-PCIE2U3), but it will likely be about $60. The drive itself is $200 for 1TB, $250 for 1.5TB, and $400 for 2TB, and it ships with Memeo AutoBackup software for both the Mac or PC.

CyberPower just announced that it is upgrading its Gamer Xtreme series. The new line of CyberPower Gamer Xtreme PCs will come with USB 3.0 and SATA III as standard. Prices start as low as $749. Buyers can configure and order a Gamer Xtreme system with the new specs today.

Intel’s latest i5/i7 processors and P55/X58 chipsets will give you some nice performance and both USB 3.0 and SATA III are backward compatible so your system will have a longer life as well.

USB 3.0 devices are just now showing up for mass consumption and Super Talent is leading the charge, having just introduced the first USB 3.0 flash drive, which promises transfer rates of up to 320MB/sec.

If you have a USB 3.0 socket, you’ll get speeds up to 200MB/sec. If you use it in a USB 2.0 connector it will slow to USB 2.0 speeds of course. No word on a price or release date, but expect it to ship soon in 32GB, 64GB and 128GB capacities.

If you’ve been waiting for USB 3.0, Asus has announced a new range of motherboards that offer up true USB 3.0 and SATA 6Gb/s data performance. The Asus Xtreme Design P7P55D-E Series motherboard has onboard support, while the ASUS Xtreme Design P7P55D Series uses the Asus U3S6 PCIe x4 expansion card to offer the latest USB and SATA data transfer capabilities. Transferring a 20GB HD movie now takes less than 70 seconds, while a 4MB song requires less than 0.01sec.

Both come with the Intel P55 Express chipset that supports the latest LGA 1156 socket for Intel Core i7/Core i5 Processors and exclusive Hybrid Technology (Hybrid Processor, Hybrid Phase, and Hybrid OS) for intelligent performance enhancement, active cooling, and rapid online access.

Dane-Elec has just announced a new line of So SuperSpeed hard drives and SSDs which use the up and coming USB 3.0 standard. The drives can hit the amazing speed of 250MBps which is about ten times that of USB 2.0.

Capacities range from 500GB to 2TB for the hard drive. The SSDs come in 80GB and 160GB capacities. The So SuperSpeed drives will hit on December 11th, with the 500GB hard drive costing $180 while the SSDs will cost you $400 and $800 for the 80GB and 160GB capacities.

So where’s all that USB 3.0 gear at? Well, at least Buffalo has something to offer. The HD-HU3 series of USB 3.0 hard disks will be the “world’s first” to ship. Buffalo will make NEC’s roughly $60 IFC-PCIE2U3 2-port PCI Expressx1 host controller available with its hard drives when they ship this month in Japan.

The 1TB and 1.5TB drives will cost about $225 and about $284. A 2TB disk is on the way later for about $523. Awesome. Now you have something to use those 3.0 cables with.