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ioSafe Solo Keeps External Drives Safe from Fire and Water

Paul Lilly — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 09:04:29 -0600

Should you have the misfortune of experiencing a flood or fire in your home, backing up your digital photos, music, documents, and other data probably isn't high on your list of things to do. Even power users tend to put family and pets first, and for those of you that are married, don't forget the wedding album (for the wife) and universal remote (for the husband).

A new product by Solo promises to keep your data safe in the event of a disaster if you don't have time to pick up your computer, laptop, and other devices containing your data. The company's ioSafe is an external USB 2.0 storage unit capable of holding up to 1.5TB, but unlike typical external backup drives, the ioSafe was built to withstand extreme situations. Solo says it can survive temperatures up to 1550° F for 30 minutes and/or being submerged in 10 feet of fresh- or saltwater for 3 days. To prove it, Solo posted a video demonstrating situations you probably (definitely) shouldn't try at home.

The ioSafe is available for preorder (ships January 28, 2009) in 500GB, 1TB, and 1.5TB capacities for $150, $200, and $300 respectively.

Image Credit: Solo

LG BE06 External Blu-Ray Burner

Katherine Stevenson — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 11:00:00 -0500

We expected LG’s new 6x external Blu-ray burner to perform similarly to the company’s GBW-H20L internal offering, what with the two having identical read/write speed ratings, but we were wrong. The external drive is a bigger, more expensive letdown.

Like the GBW-H20L, the BE06 external model boasts an industry-leading 6x BD-R write rating. And here the latter performed accordingly, writing 22GB of data to a single-layer BD-R disc in a brisk 22:43 (min:sec). In BD-RE writes, however, the BE06 faltered—badly. Boasting the same 2x rating for rewriteable media as the GBW-H20L, the BE06 took more than twice as long as that drive to write 22GB of data to a BD-RE disc—a full hour and 28 minutes! That’s actually slower than just about any Blu-ray burner we’ve tested in recent memory. Not good.

The BE06 redeemed itself with DVD-R writes. The drive is rated at 16x and was able to write 4.38GB to a single-layer disc in 5:42—a second faster than the LG GBW-H20L. The drives were as closely matched on DVD-R reads.

While there’s something to be said for the convenience of an external drive with a USB 2.0 interface, this is offset by the BE06’s gargantuan size. The enclosure is nearly 3 inches longer and an inch wider than its internal brethren—and $100 more expensive. Blu-ray is a tough enough sell as it is without tacking on this drive’s compromises. We’re unimpressed.

Seagate FreeAgent Pro

David Murphy — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 18:17:16 -0600

From a design perspective, the Seagate FreeAgent Pro is nearly perfect. The company has turned out a device that looks, dare we say, Apple-esque. Or maybe Orange-esque, the prevailing color that glows and pulsates through the middle of the drive’s tower-like drive holder.

If the FreeAgent’s performance were as noteworthy as the design of this USB-, FireWire-, and eSATA-ready enclosure, we’d have a real winner on our hands. Our model used a 750GB 7200.10 Barracuda drive, and one heckuva clog must exist within the device’s interface, or some hidden quiet-mode feature enabled by default. We were surprised to see only 44.7MB/s average read speeds—on an eSATA connection, no less. The internal version lives in the 66MB/s range, so what gives?

The FreeAgent Pro does little to impress in terms of features as well. Seagate still uses the ever-crappy Memeo AutoBackup application as its primary backup solution, if the name didn’t otherwise give that fact away. Curiously, the drive comes with a system rollback feature. You know, just like that thing that’s bundled with… every modern version of the Windows operating system. And don’t forget the FreeAgent Pro’s Internet Drive–for a mere $120 a year, you can back up 5GB of files online!

If looks were all that mattered, the FreeAgent Pro would be the greatest external drive available today. Too bad poor performance and a lack of features get in the way.

OWC Mercury On-the-Go External Drive

David Murphy — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 19:05:26 -0500

There are three schools of thought concerning external storage solutions: build an oversized bookend that rocks out with huge amounts of storage, sculpt a supremely portable device that you’d actually want to carry around, or just make a plain-vanilla enclosure. OWC’s Mercury On-the-Go drive is a surprise contender in the second category, as it’s a delightful combination of portability and speed.

OWC has a number of models available; the one we tested features USB and FireWire connections, with an included Seagate Momentus 7200.2 SATA drive as the main source of storage. Firing up our tried-and-true HD Tach tests, we were pleased to see the device performing admirably on both its USB and FireWire 400 connections.

In essence, the Seagate drive fills the pipe. Connecting the clear external device via USB supplied us with an average read speed of 35.7MB/s, which is very near the maximum real-world throughput for USB 2.0. We saw a small boost in speeds when using the FireWire 400 connection, but the mere increase of 5MB/s for the average read speed is nothing to write home about.

That said, our biggest complaint with this particular model is that there’s really no way to maximize the 7,200RPM drive’s capabilities. Sure, you can connect to the enclosure via FireWire 800, but who has a FireWire 800 connector on their PC? We don’t even have one in the Lab. An eSATA connection should be a staple for all enclosures like this; why bother with FireWire 800?

The drive is geared for people on the go, which we’re assuming means “people of the laptop variety.” Still, we were a bit taken aback by the short length of the included transfer cords. Details are important, OWC; the Mercury On-the-Go is great, but a little tweaking would a Kick Ass make.