by Stuart Davidson | 14th May 2013
Normally when a company releases a 512GB USB 3.0 drive we would assume that it was a 2.5" form factor model, often using a mechanical drive but occasionally containing a SSD. Kingston havent taken that route though and instead have managed to fit half a gigabyte of storage into a much more compact package. So compact in fact that they include an attachment so that it can be carried about with us along with our keys.
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by Stuart Davidson | 25th April 2013
Looking to diversify their business even more ZOTAC recently released the RAIDBOX, a compact USB 3.0 enclosure which allows us to install two mSATA hard drives then RAID them for enhanced performance/data protection. Today we have a sample on our test bench, along with two high spec 256GB mSATA drives from ADATA.
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by Stuart Davidson | 23rd April 2013
So it is always great when we see a portable drive that contains an SSD and uses USB 3.0, both of which should remove the USB 2.0 connector and mechanical drive bottlenecks which we regularly see. Thats where the MiniStaion SSD Edition enters, but Buffalo havent stopped there, they also provide a Thunderbolt interface for Mac users (and those who have an appropriate motherboard for PC).
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by Stuart Davidson | 22nd March 2011
Since this reviewer started testing components there has been little change in the way we connect external storage devices. USB, primarily 2.0 has been the main connection method with some manufacturers dabbling with eSATA, Firewire and even LAN connectors with varying success. Finally though it looks like we will be moving on from the 30MB/s cap of USB 2.0 as pretty much every device from low cost net tops to high end motherboards now come through our labs with USB 3.0 connectivity.
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by Grace | 25th January 2010
Today we will have a look at the latest product from Xigmatek which offers a compromise between the small size of flash drives and the more reasonable cost of 2.5" drives, the Lighter 60GB USB drive.
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by Henry Butt | 23rd November 2009
Today we are going to look at two of the latest offerings from Active Media Products, the WWF BLU Penguin and the Executive I-Pen USB drives. These both combine novelty with function, instantly noticeable by their innovative enclosures.
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by Stuart Davidson | 27th May 2009
Today we have three flash drives on our test bench, all of which target a different part of the market. Do any of them suit your needs? Read on to find out.
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by Nathan Marks | 7th November 2008
Today were going to look at two mini USB drives, the Corsair Voyager Mini and the SuperTalent Pico. Both of these drives are smaller than most USB drives on the market but still facilitate the storage of large amounts of data with both drives available with 8GB of space.
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by Grace | 28th May 2008
Corsairs Voyager GT flash drives are one of the most respected high speed USB storage solutions, for years they have been considered by many enthusiasts as class leading. That said, as flash drive technology has been advancing other manufacturers have been able to catch up. Corsair recently cancelled most of their Voyager GT drives and a few days later began to offer only an updated, single 16GB version of the Voyager GT.
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by Stuart Davidson | 12th May 2008
Most people could not live without their favourite keyboard, mouse or headset but there is one other device which connects with a PC and is essential to daily life for many of us, USB storage.
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by Grace | 27th February 2008
Introduction
USB flash drives are the most popular and the fastest advancing gadget in the technology market and the rate at which they are progressing is remarkable. Early USB flash drives were bulky and their capacity was often in the 32-64MB range. Today we have 4-8GB flash drives which are about the size of a cell phone SIM card and many companies are releasing 32GB flash drives already! Such is the progress that within a period of six months prices have dropped around 50%. Today we will take a look at no less than 19 different USB flash drives from 10 different companies.
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by Grace | 9th January 2008
Today we are going to have a look at another interesting product from Enermax. While most people who read the word “Enermax” would think that this is a review of yet another power supply unit, think again. Enermax have a wide range of products available from Phoenix cases to Aurora keyboards.
In this review we are going to take a look at their new external HDD cases line-up, the Jazz range. The Jazz enclosures are designed to offer optimal (yet fanless) cooling in mind, discreetly keeping your external disks cooler. Read on to find more about their looks, quality and performance.
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by Grace | 19th September 2007
Akasa have a very large product range but most of them focus around computer case cooling and modding accessories, such as fans, modding products and power supply units. Akasa designs and build external enclosures for all internal drive sizes, from 5.25” optical drives down to 2.5” notebook drives, each built for a different purpose. Today we have three enclosures for 3.5” drives on review, each designed for different types of users.
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by Grace | 29th June 2007
USB flash drives are a wonderful invention, they are extremely small and lightweight, reliable, fast and they require very little power. The icing on the cake is if you have a USB capable computer (and who doesn't in 2007?) you can use them for portable storage. It is not all positive however, flash drives have tiny plastic bodies, which tend to make them very weak and they are easily lost. Enter Corsair, who have taken a very different approach to his storage medium recently, they have designed a drive which is extremely durable to physical damage - in fact Corsair claim it is almost indestructible. In making this drive so they have made the drive somewhat larger, which in theory should mean it will also be harder to lose.
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by Rasta | 10th November 2006
With the advent of Serial ATA storage, a new era was ushered in for the PC. The cumbersome grey ribbon cables we all grew up with were a thing of the past, as was the bottlenecked Parallel ATA bus. Not only did SATA improve performance and unclutter cases, it also gave mainstream PCs the ability to “hot-swap” hard drives without restarting the host operating system, a trick that had been out of reach for everyone except server operators running immensely expensive SCSI controllers and drives.
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by Grace | 16th October 2006
Today we will have a look at their new line of enclosures, the File Protector. The File Protector enclosures range from 3.5” IDE drive enclosures down to 1.8” Hitachi drive enclosures. But the big selling point about the File Protector is that special backup software is bundled with them, which in theory should result in no lost files should a main hard drive unexpectedly die.
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by Stuart Davidson | 21st December 2004
USB Drives have become something of a must have in the tech community, almost everyone I work with has one and I’ve noticed more and more recently that “ordinary” people are picking them up too. Whilst your average USB drive will have acceptable performance and function as advertised it’s always nice to have the best of the best. Corsair are renowned for their quality ram and when we heard they were releasing a USB flash drive we were keen to get a look at it and find out just what they could do with this technology. So today for review we have Corsair’s Flash Voyager USB drive.
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by Stuart Davidson | 20th October 2004
The Ultra MPD is a very compact unit, barely bigger than a 3.5inch hard drive width and thickness wise. The unit is slightly longer to incorporate the IDE and power circuitry, USB and Firewire sockets and the 40mm cooling fan.
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