The march of the mini music drives | CNET News.com: “Later this month, Dell is expected to come out with its Dell Digital Jukebox portable MP3 player that use a 1.8-inch hard drive, which is about the size of the one in the iPod. Meanwhile, Samsung and others are promoting players with a still-smaller drive from a start-up company, Cornice. ”

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Needing to move my personal files off of my work PC, as I leave Yahoo!/Overture for my new playground at Knight Ridder Digital, I went to Best Buy this past weekend to buy a 40 GB iPod.

None of the sales people could tell me definitively if it included a Firewaire->USB 2.0 adapter. So, I bought it ($540.00 w/ tax), opened it in front of them, found that it did NOT have the part (remember, this is being sold as a Windows product in a store that is primarily Windows oriented). Worse yet, Best Buy didn’t have a standalone part and recommended a trip to Fry’s.

Instead, I went to Fry’s and bought a 200GB external Fireware/US, 7200 RPM, 2MB buffer, in a relatively portable size/weight, for $300. It isn’t an iPod replacement, but it’ll certainly serve me well… and allow me to wait a while longer for my true personal portable HD solution.

The disappoint here, is of course, that Apple ‘gets it’ — it’s about the portable HD, and the apps that you can build off that, vs. extending an MP3 into new areas. Deeje and I have been talking about portable HDs, bluetooth, etc for a couple years now — it will indeed revolutionize everything.

Just a shame that Apple missed out on a sale over a $3 part!