All in One

Showing posts with label Transcend. Show all posts

Friday, October 26, 2012

Review: Transcend StoreJet Cloud

PortableGood media playback with supported filesFair priceOnly USB 2.0Unsupported file types won't play

While some smartphones and tablets are happy to enable you to increase their capacities by inserting SD cards and the like, if you've got something such as an iPad or iPhone, then upgrading your memory is a far more expensive procedure. The prices being mooted for the rather modest jump from the 16GB to the 32GB iPhone 5 can be eye wateringly expensive.

The idea behind the Transcend StoreJet Cloud is that you can load it up with files you can't fit on your smartphone or tablet, and then connect it to your mobile device via Wi-Fi, where you can access and play back files.

It also has a wireless bridge mode, to connect to your wireless internet. It's a nice touch that enables you to browse the internet on your smartphone or tablet, while it's also connected to the Transcend StoreJet Cloud.

At first the drive acts like a standard USB drive, since you plug it into your PC and copy your files over. While the solid state drive inside the Transcend StoreJet Cloud is a welcome feature, it only supports USB 2.0, so transferring over large amounts of data can take a while.

An app is available for iOS or Android devices that enables you to browse the files after you've connected your phone to the Transcend StoreJet Cloud's Wi-Fi.

It's an easy process, and though there was some lag when browsing our files, it worked alright for photos. We could swipe between photos, and after a slight pause the photo would appear.

Video playback is also good, as long as the files you have are in the right format - otherwise problems occur. Still, there's a wide enough range of file types supported.

We've seen products similar to this in the Kingston Wi-Drive and the Seagate GoFlex Satellite, which fell short of our expectations. While the Transcend StoreJet Cloud is sometimes hit and miss, mainly this is a solid product that comes far closer to reaching its lofty goal of wirelessly expanding our smartphone and tablet's capacities at a reasonable price.

Thursday, October 25, 2012

Review: Transcend SSD18C3

ExpensiveNeeds a second USB for full speed

No matter how fast the connection is, sometimes external hard drives are only as fast as the hard drives they contain. Even with super-speed connections such as USB 3.0 or Thunderbolt, if the hard drive itself is slow, then you're not going to see the whole benefit of the faster (and more expensive) connections.

The Transcend SSD18C3 USB 3.0 Portable Solid State Drive doesn't have that problem, since it contains a solid state drive, rather than the older mechanical drives. This means it can read and write data very fast, and therefore take advantage of the faster USB 3.0 connection.

Compare this to the G-Technology G-Raid with Thunderbolt, which has the even faster Thunderbolt connection, yet has a 7,200rpm mechanical hard drive, which means the speed of the hard drive is slowing the whole thing down.

The speeds we recorded in our benchmarking tests backed up Transcend's claims of this being a speedy little hard drive, with write speeds of 151.07MB/s and read speeds of a very impressive 234.94MB/s.

In our real-world tests, a 5GB folder containing 150 files was transferred over in just 1 minute 31 seconds. So yeah. Pretty fast.

The Transcend SSD18C3 is small and light, and has a sturdy rubberised case that provides military shock-resistance. An auto-backup button is a nice addition to the hard drive, and can be set up using the Windows-only software available to download from Transcend's website.

The Transcend SSD18C3 comes with a dual-headed USB cable, with one head for data and the second one for supplying power, though it can work with power supplied from a single USB port.

The Transcend SSD18C3 USB 3.0 Portable Solid State Drive is fast, light and sturdy, with some good backup options. Everything you'd want in an external hard drive. The only downside is the relatively small capacity.

Saturday, October 6, 2012

Review: Transcend StoreJet 35T3

Big capacityQuick backup buttonWell builtUSB 3.0 interfaceIncluded software is a bit basicCheaper options

We've always liked Transcend's products, especially the Transcend StoreJet 25M3 external hard drive. Where that one had a durable case that kept the drive inside secure from drops and knocks, the focus of the Transcend StoreJet 35T3 USB 3.0 External Hard Drive is quick and secure data backup.

The secure side of things is taken care of with tried and tested 256-bit AES security that will keep your important files under lock and key and away from prying eyes.

The backing up side of things is taken care of with a combination of the TranscendElite software and a dedicated 'Backup' button on the front of the drive that when pushed begins backing up your files to the external hard drive.

The button itself is a great idea, since it makes the backing up process - one that can so easily be overlooked in our day-to-day computing - very simple.

You can also set the drive to automatically back up your files and folders via the TranscendElite software by adding a schedule, but if your PC isn't on at the specific time, the ability to press the button and back up straight away when you remember is very convenient.

The TranscendElite software itself is rather basic, with very little frills, but it was relatively straightforward to set up a back-up procedure.

Overall the Transcend StoreJet 35T3 is a well-made, and fast (if you're using USB 3.0) external hard drive, with some good backup options. The 2TB of space (3TB is also available) is a huge amount that can hold a lot of your documents.