The successor to the popular Samsung T1 portable SSD is US$50 off at Amazon. It's the same price as the discontinued T1 SSD when it's on sale, so you might as well get the latest model instead. It's now a (partial) metal enclosure for better heat dissipation too.
CamelCamelCamel.
I was surprised things in Korea were more expensive than Australia for the most part - but I didn't take a look at Korean Technology.
Okay, couldn't resist and finally jumped on board an SSD deal.
Thanks OP, great deal.
What is the use case scenario for one of these ?
They're great for drop-resistant, high-speed portable storage. If you regularly copy lots of large files back and forth, or image lots of computers, the speed will be useful.
You can edit videos off them with no concerns over drive fragmentation, or store a copy of your huge Lightroom libraries on them so you can edit offsite.
You can also store a backup copy of your holiday photos/videos when you're on holiday (or on a shoot). If your laptop falls off the hotel bed and screws the hard drive, you'll still have a drop-resistant copy on hand.
Yeah. Seems hugely useful for a laptop which may come with limited storage of its own and where you want quick access to files.
This sounds really useful in all honesty. I don't think i would get much use out of it though, but still appreciate that it's very cool.
I wonder if you put a normal SSD into a normal HDD enclosure if things like trim would still work.
I use one like an HDD but obviously it's smaller, lighter, tougher and can run on mobile devices without external power. It's great for travelling, especially if you get HDD anxiety like me about drops, magnets, etc.
TRIM is handled by the OS so for Linux/Windows it would work but OSX is pretty bad at dealing with TRIM at all, let alone with external drives. You can't even get SMART info on an external drive in OSX without installing a third party driver.
what would be the primary use case for a portable SSD for most people?
It's not like we will run an OS on a portable?
If it's for data storage i don't see much point buying this.
It's not for everyone. I think the people who would benefit the most from a portable SSD would already know about it. If you don't see much point in it, it probably won't benefit your use cases.
A 500gb fast portable hard drive would probaly be useful to someone who wants to move around lots of data fast.
It's like asking, what's the use of a rocket ship to anyone? I just don't need one.
I would have thought the USB 3 interface would be a larger bottleneck than the the speed of a 7200-rpm 2.5inch HDD.
Nah, 2.5" mechanical drives are incredibly slow.
This 1TB Hitachi 7200rpm drive has an STR of 123MB/s over SATA. The Samsung T3 benchmarked at 430MB/s read and 404.5MB/s write.
When you take into account fragmentation and mechanical drive access times, the SSD will absolutely blow a mechanical drive out of the water when it comes to things like video editing.
@eug:
I don't disagree with you that 2.5" mechanical drives are slow but is the USB3 interface fast enough to make SSD faster than 2.5" 7200rpm HDD in the real world?
@JB1: Yes. If you click on the review link I posted in the reply above, you'll see that this specific Samsung T3 USB3 SSD benchmarked at 430MB/s read. That's nearly three times faster than a 2.5" mechanical hard drive over SATA6.
USB 3.0 (and 3.1 Gen 1), which this SSD supports, can handle 5Gbps. That's 625MB/s, which is 5 times faster than the 7200rpm 2.5" drive I mentioned earlier. USB definitely isn't a bottleneck here.
There's not really any comparison. I get sub 100MB/s with my 2.5inch drive, and 400MB/s+ with my 1TB T3.
Good to know.
I will get one when the price comes down. I don't move large quantity of data to justify it at this price, just buying for the sake of buying it.
I just got an SSD caddy and MSATA drive, DIY for a bit cheaper if you can be bothered.
Very handy as they are light and much more portable (compared to HDD).
Do you have a link to what you purchased Mechz? I couldn't find a drive for cheaper than this price, let alone a drive + caddy.
Samsung 500G MSATA drive is $215 at PC Case Gear or US$160 at Amazon.
Not only is this deal cheaper, it has a small spiffy case with a USB-C interface - much neater than the cheap caddies with the ugly extended USB 3 micro connector.
Just ordered one as very good price. Added a few of these to the order for $6.25 each extra.
ADATA USA UV140 16GB USB 3.0 Flash
can i get warranty in Aus if i buy it ?
USB 3.1 is around the corner which should make it 3x faster than USB 3.. Must resist this one!
This drive actually supports USB 3.1. It just comes with a USB 3.0 cable because that's what everyone has now.
USB 3.0 is also called USB 3.1 Gen 1.
https://gaming.msi.com/article/usb-3-1-gen1-gen2-explained
When Samsung says USB 3.1, I think they mean USB 3.1 Gen 1.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/3034714/storage/samsung-t3-re…
Yup it's Gen 1. The SSD itself doesn't saturate Gen 1 anyway, so no point for Gen 2 at the moment.
@eug: Kinda thought Overshopper was saying 3.1 as 3.1 Gen 2, just adding bits of details in (because just saying USB 3.1 can refer to either Gen 1 or Gen 2).
Type C is the physical plug that's reversible.
USB 3.1 Gen1 is the protocol. It has the same raw speed as USB3 (5Gb/s) but among other things has a standard power negotiation protocol for high speed charging (up to 100W). Previous fast charging protocols were proprietary.
USB 3.1 Gen2 supports 10Gb/s speed.
@trongy: Huh, didn't know that even USB 3.1 Gen 1 could do 100W. I knew that "USB 3.1" could technically charge up to 100W, but I thought it was just for Gen 2 paired with USB Type C plug, not Gen 1. To be honest, I was under the impression that USB 3.0 and USB 3.1 Gen 1 were same thing.
I guess I learn new things every day. Anyways, thanks for the clarification.
This drive is good. Just bought a 250GB one from MSY for $178, used it as the main drive for my 2012 iMac. The read speed is 430MB/s and write more than 300MB/s.
The 256gb pny USB key for $75 was much better. Smaller. Convenient. And fast. Bought 2 of them.
There's a huge difference between the two. Very different use cases, and reputation for reliability. They're really good for what they are though, I'm very satisfied with my 128GB PNY.
nnooooooo
must resist. this is an aewsom price. was in seoul last month and saw these in the samsung lifestyle store. pricing was ridiculous though, but it's a very compact product.