Thunderbolt External Drives (Part 2)
3. Seagate Goflex Thunderbolt Adaptor
Seagate’s modular GoFlex system takes a
slightly different tack to its rivals. The idea is simple: if you have an
existing 2.5in Seagate GoFlex drive, you can turn it into a Thunderbolt disk by
simply slotting it into the appropriate caddy. This approach makes it
impossible to make promises about performance, since this will depend on which
disk you use. We installed a 1TB drive from 2011 (originally sold with a USB 3
caddy) and saw identical speeds to those delivered by the Buffalo MiniStation.
In principle the Thunderbolt caddy should support much faster drives, but at
present Seagate doesn’t offer any SSD-based GoFlex models.
As it stands, therefore, the GoFlex
Thunderbolt Adaptor is - like Buffalo’s MiniStation - probably only worth
considering if you have a Mac that supports Thunderbolt but lacks USB 3.
Otherwise it makes more sense to pay for a USB 3 cable - or not much more for
an entire new drive - than to splash out $105 for this.
4. Lacie Little Big Disk Thunderbolt SSD
LaCie’s SSD-based Thunderbolt drive looks
chunkier than most, but that’s because it contains two 120GB disks, which you
may choose to use in separate, spanned, striped or mirrored configuration.
Individually, these solid-state models outshone Buffalo’s mechanical drive in
our tests, but couldn’t match the large- file transfer rates of Elgato’s drive.
Combine the two disks into a RAID0 array,
though, and performance rockets: we saw large-file read and write speeds jump
to 267MB/sec and 284MB/sec. Even small-file operations were slightly
accelerated, with write speeds hitting 74MB/sec.
However, you may baulk at using RAID0 for
storing important files, since it doubles the likelihood of a hardware failure
leading to irrecoverable data loss. SSDs are less prone to this than mechanical
drives, since they have no moving parts, but if you plan to use the Little Big
Disk in this mode, you should make sure you have a good backup system in place.
At $700 for this model, LaCie’s twin- disk
Thunderbolt drive isn’t a bargain, but it’s cheaper and more versatile than
Elgato’s 240GB drive. It also offers a second Thunderbolt port, and a bundle of
complimentary backup software. Our final caveat is that it uses an external 12V
power supply, making it less suited than most to a mobile lifestyle.
|
|
Buffalo
Ministation Thunderbolt
|
Elgato
Thunderbolt SSD
|
Lacie
Little Big Disk Thunderbolt SSD
|
Seagate
Goflex Thunderbolt Adaptor
|
|
Overall
|
4/6
|
3/6
|
5/6
|
3/6
|
|
Capacity
|
500GB, 1TB
|
120GB, 240GB
|
240GB
|
N/A
|
|
Drive type
|
Mechanical
|
SSD
|
2xSSD
|
N/A
|
|
Price
|
TBC
|
$349
|
$701
|
$105
|
|
Supplier
|
TBC
|
www.elgato.com
|
www.lacie.com
|
www.seagate.com
|
External
drive small-file read/write speeds (MB/sec)
External
drive large-file read/write speeds (MB/sec)
Verdict
Clearly, Thunderbolt drives are fast - but
they’re also expensive, and for everyday use there’s much to be said for
sticking with USB 3 (especially considering that any PC with Thunderbolt is
guaranteed to have multiple USB 3 ports). For professionals, however, who are
willing to pay for top-speed storage, Thunderbolt is exciting - and as the
market grows, prices will surely fall. We look forward to seeing what
Thunderbolt brings in the coming months and years.
