Are we there with external SSDs?

[JHZR2]

What's your opinion?

Got a new iPhone for a Christmas, realized the rest of our stuff wasn't fully up to date. Backing up our phones and tablets takes a lot of hdd space in our computers (SSDs themselves).

I found how to set the commands in Mac OS X to allow phones to backup to an external drive. Was going to use my trusty external HDD, but was worried about speed in transferring upwards of 300GB of personal electronics data.

So for $95, I bought a Samsung T5 External SSD, 500GB.

Definitely, definitely worth it on speed.

Tried to dupe it, wrote over 500GB of data to it, trashed it, wrote more, got it to slow down, but still not as slow as a traditional HDD.

And the size is incredible. So compact..

Yes, you can get 3-4 TB of storage in an external drive for about the same money. Got it. And for stuff like photos, they're fine. But this sort of a drive really does speed up certain items substantially...

So, what's the risk and how does that exposure compare to doing the same thing on a traditional HDD?

 

[spackard]

I like the T5. It's mature. It's encrypted.
However, I think they may be a bit past tech for the kids these days.
I think the interface is going to USB-C and Samsung doesn't look interested in keeping up.

Form factors for SSDs are quickly going to the M.2 size. The current state of the art will
go to using these in an enclosure.
https://www.amazon.com/SHINESTAR-Portable-External-Controller-ChromeBook/dp/B07KP6JCWX

If you don't need the durability of MLC or even TLC, then the market is going with cheaper flash drive USB. Not nearly as durable,
but cheap.

 

[FordBroncoVWJeta]

I have one just like it in my custom built computer. I don't remember what model of Samsung SSD 500gb but its awesome. Can't believe how fast Windows and games boot up!

 

[MoneyJohn]

Just be super super wary of hardware encryption. I have burnt myself royally due to passport hard drives and by the time I realized I had already gathered 3 more.

If you break the port, whatever it is, USB 2.0/3.0 or USB C then your data is LOST. It is not as simple as removing the drive from the enclosure and attaching another cable and retrieve the data. I have 2 passports sitting without data being retrieved, why because their USB port broke. The PCB is soldered to the disk in a really weird fashion.

Getting data retrieved professionally is VERY expensive. Lucky me that I make at least 5 backups or everything that is important to me, so I am not much worried.

Nowadays, I get internal HDD and a HDD dock and use them for a backup. Easy to retrieve the data as long as HDD doesn't fail

 

[JHZR2]

Originally Posted by spackard
I like the T5. It's mature. It's encrypted.
However, I think they may be a bit past tech for the kids these days.
I think the interface is going to USB-C and Samsung doesn't look interested in keeping up.

Form factors for SSDs are quickly going to the M.2 size. The current state of the art will
go to using these in an enclosure.
https://www.amazon.com/SHINESTAR-Portable-External-Controller-ChromeBook/dp/B07KP6JCWX

If you don't need the durability of MLC or even TLC, then the market is going with cheaper flash drive USB. Not nearly as durable,
but cheap.


This drive came with USB C on the body, and a USB C - USB C cable and a USB C - USB A cable. Nice cables as well.

Originally Posted by MoneyJohn
Just be super super wary of hardware encryption. I have burnt myself royally due to passport hard drives and by the time I realized I had already gathered 3 more.

If you break the port, whatever it is, USB 2.0/3.0 or USB C then your data is LOST. It is not as simple as removing the drive from the enclosure and attaching another cable and retrieve the data. I have 2 passports sitting without data being retrieved, why because their USB port broke. The PCB is soldered to the disk in a really weird fashion.


Scary. Im one for keeping copies. I got this for routine phone backups only. So it wont get a lot of transport, etc.

But for other critical stuff, I do keep a spare drive backed up every so often offsite. I was thinking at one point of just getting an SATA connector, and keeping external HDDs in rotation. But I suspect the small drives and SSDs are more robust to other events besides tons of hours....

 

[Rand]

They are nice, but not worth the 8x cost over conventional hdd in most cases IMO.
(4tb for $84 currently)

of course after saying that, I paid $300 for a samsung 950 pro 250GB m.2 nvme drive when they came out in 2015.

 

[bobdoo]

I've got 3 older bare SSD's that I use to backup my MS SP4. I use a SATA to USB cable, no other hardware needed.

I also have a stack of old HDD's, and use those in a drive caddy, which is needed to supply extra power to the HDDs.

And I back up my MS Go to uSD cards, which are cheap.

Back up early, back up often.

One is none, two is one!

 

[JHZR2]

Originally Posted by Rand
They are nice, but not worth the 8x cost over conventional hdd in most cases IMO.
(4tb for $84 currently)

of course after saying that, I paid $300 for a samsung 950 pro 250GB m.2 nvme drive when they came out in 2015.


Thing is that 4tb $84 drove will never match in speed. For synchronizing 128-256GB phones, the added speed is a major factor and benefit.

Unless something made them particularly bombproof, not sure I'd buy one for bulk storage.

They're just particularly good for phone backups to keep significant image sizes off your boot ssd and portable/external (so my wife and I can use the same drive).

I'm very pleased!

 

[Andrew1972]

Do you really get a speed difference with phones? The transfer speeds are simply not the fast across iOS and the lightning port if used is really slow compared to throughput of SSD.

I don't even think the speed of iPhone on wireless or lightning cable approaches the speed of a USB 3.0 Drive with a spinning disk.

Btw I wanted the SSD you got

but the place I contract too blocks my USB port for writes on my MBP so no dice.

 

[Rand]

Originally Posted by JHZR2
[

They're just particularly good for phone backups to keep significant image sizes off your boot ssd and portable/external (so my wife and I can use the same drive).

I'm very pleased!


what sorts of speeds are you seeing my usb 3.0 hdd will do over 100MB/Sec.

my phone usb is usually around 40-50MB/S max even on usb 3.1 port(computer end)

that was with samsung s8, have tried yet with the pixel 3.. and havent really looked into it much.
If I find I have a 20+GB files to move around I use microsd reader anyway (VR and such)