I used to think i was down with the kids, but at the ripe old age of 36, I’m going to have to admit it. I’m too old for the Skin Hard Drive by Iomega. The storage specialist have teamed up with Skin Industries to produce three 500 GB portable hard drives with designs that, and I’m quoting here, “express your unique style”.
Why am I too old for the Skin Hard Drive? Well, to be honest, I had to look up Skin Industries on Google (carefully, mind) which apparently is a company which “continues to take “Sports Fashion” to new heights”.
Skin Industries was founded in 1998 by adult film legend and entrepreneur Al Borda. It got in at the ground level during the early days of freestyle motocross and began with a small line of dirt bike graphics and motocross gear. The label quickly developed a unique, hardcore following in the So Cal dirt bike scene and is now a huge brand in its own right with a long list of official Skin store locations and celebrity endorsements. The Skin Industries empire now includes Skin Clothing, Skin Entertainment, Skin Records, Skin Europe and a string of specialized Skin Industries stores.
So, there you go. Even unique, hardcore So Cal dirt bikers need to move their data around, and they’re sure to be comfortable with one Iomega’s three drives. From left to right, they can express their unique style with “Knock Out”, “Red Hot Skin” and finally “Radical” which challenges the owner to “Show Some” (show some what? Spreadsheets?)
In one of the funniest press quotes I’ve read in some time, Iomega’s President of Consumer and Small Business Products, Jonathan Huberman describes the drives as follows:
The new Iomega Skin Drives exude an alternative personality with eye-catching Skin Industries graphics that demand the attention of anyone who doesn’t accept the status quo, who zigs when others zag, especially when it comes to the look and design of their digital devices.
Being handed a choice of designs to review, I expressed my unique style by selecting Red Hot Skin, which “features a “Skin” Swipe logo printing on a red top with a black base, creating a definition of hip and hot for today’s young iconoclastic computer user.” Yup, sounds like me. I was about to choose Knock Out, but had second thoughts when I read that “one look at this portable hard drive beauty and envious friends and co-workers could be down for the count” – I’m not sure WGS has that kind of insurance in place for the office.
First Looks
The Skin Hard Drive is packaged in a faux-raw cardboard box with spot varnish image of the drive up front. Open up the box in your usual iconoclastic way and you’ll find the drive packaged neatly with a USB cable as well as a hip and hot quick install manual.
Your first thought may be to plug the drive into a PC and move some data around, but if like me, you’re the kind of guy who zigs when others zag, you’ll cruise over to iomega.com where you can express your personal style by downloading the bundled Iomega Protection Suite software.
Now you may have thought that Iomega’s association with adult film legend and entrepreneur Al Borda may have resulted in some pretty iconoclastic content shipping with the drive. But no, it’s the usual zig when others zig anti-virus and backup data protection. The suite comprises a year’s free subscription to Trend Micro Internet Security, vClone imaging software, Roxio Retrospect backup software for PC and Mac plus the usual 2GB online storage freebie from Mozy Home.
