Prestigio has just released the Data Safe II external HDD enclosure that blends fashion with state-of-the-art technology. The new USB HDD enclosure is fully covered in leather and rather resembles a cigarette box than a miniature hard-disk drive.

The USB hard-disk drive enclosure is fully covered in a luxurious looking tan colored leather and measures 62×101x12 mm. It is truly portable, given its miniature size and the mere 110 grams weight, disk included. Under the cow skin hood, users can find an USB 2.0 powered hard-disk drive in a 2.5-inch form factor. The drive draws its operating power directly from the computer via the USB port and comes with 2MB cache.

Moreover, the disk features a discrete on/off switch to disconnect it from the notebook when not in use, without plugging it off. This way, the notebook user can preserve the battery life when external storage is not needed.

The HDD enclosure also comes with one-touch backup functionality, provided via the Copy button. Users can make identical copies of their internal disk, then store the data directly on the Prestigio Data Safe II, thanks to the supplied software. However, the one-touch backup feature can be accessed only after the bundled software has been installed on the computer.

The drive can work with almost any operating system that can handle USB 2.0 connections. It has been tested on Windows 98SE/Me/2000/XP/ Windows 2003 Server/Vista, Mac OS 9.x and 10.x or higher, as well as on Linux 2.4 and higher. However, if you plan on using the Prestigio Data Safe II on Linux and Mac, you will be limited to the FAT32 file system only.

The disk enclosure can handle public and private partitions. However, since RFID or fingerprint authentication systems are not present, access to the private partition is granted after entering the correct password.

The Prestigio Data Safe II comes in 80 or 160 GB models, that can be purchased for $110 and $190, respectively.