Freecom 250GB Toughdrive 2.5 Inch USB 2.0 Hard Drive
£73.61
- Freecom
- 29409
Good but no coconut - This drive is handy in that it has a built in USB lead but it is not long enough for a Tower PC and dangles from the USB port! Hard disk drives are designed to operate flat or at 90 degrees. It is difficult to lie the drive flat using the short USB lead. Any movement could also cause a head crash so I am not convinced of the wisdom of using this short lead unless it is with a notebook (but see later).Also, it cannot be used to boot notebooks from (I think due to power reasons). This may explain why some notebook users have found it to be unreliable.I now have bought a new USB drive that uses two USB cables to get power from a notebook and that works as a bootable drive.If you want to use this with a notebook you may need to get a power supply. This then makes the whole thing non-portable in my view which was the appeal of the thing in the first place.It is also impossible to take apart as it is sealed. This may be good for reliability, but if it goes wrong (e.g. broken cable) you cannot get at the hard disk to try it in another caddy.I now use this as a storage backup device for important files only.Disappointing.
DONT TRUST THEM! - I have owned a toughdrive similar to the above for a year and was very happy with it until I made the mistake of buying a second one. I downloaded all of the data from my laptop while I sent it away to be set up to get a dual boot facility. The new Toughdrive failed within a week of purchase. After lots of discusion the Freecom help desk and lots of tests on other computers they agreed it was the drive itself. I asked if there was anyway to recover the data. The answer was THE ONLY WAY TO RECOVER THE DATA IS TO BREAK OPEN THE UNIT WHICH TOTALLY INVALIDATES THE WARRENTY THEREFORE THE UNIT WILL NOT BE REPLACED. The freecom helpdesk gave me the address of a recommended company who then quoted me 500 GBP fOr the job.
Toughdrive - Very tactile and useful. No error problems with XP or Vista. Attachment lead a bit short but extension cable makes it work well.
another good product - Another very good bit of kit. Rugged and reliable. didn t come with the back up software it was advertised with, but so what. it works.
A stunning piece of kit - I purchased this drive approximately 6 months ago as I needed a rugged and shock proof drive to store a large amount of data.On arrival the drive was much smaller than expected and the integrated USB connector is exceptional. The use of a magnet to hold the connector in place when not in use is an example of the attention to detail and thought behind this product - it wont break like a clip would, neither will the drive. I have kept this drive in my pocket and gone about my daily business numerous times and have not really noticed it s there the size is so small.Everything about this drive is impressive. It operates nearly silently (by which I mean you need to be in a quiet room with no other sound and place your ear close to it to hear anything) and with no discernable heat output.The device connected to my 3 year old laptop within 30 seconds and was transfering between my upgraded SolidState internal harddisk at blistering speeds. It works only a little slower on my 2nd computer with a traditional hard drive but still manages to copy 14gb of photos in 9 minutes.I have dropped this drive 4 times from a height worth mentioning, including one time whilst running. There was no impact on performance or function at all and the drive really does stand up to the claims of a high G-shock tolerance.I have spilt water on the drive and the external rubber casing simply wiped dry. The drive has also been carried with me daily in the hot and dusty conditions of Afghanistan and has survived all thrown at it. I have even opened the drive to use it as a caddy for other damaged drives in order to repair them and after putting the device back together have had no problems at all, impressive given that two of the drops came after I had done this.Overall I am extremely impressed with this device. For anyone caught in two minds whether it is worth it and whether to believe the marketing hype about it s toughness can rest assured that I have fully tested this product in some very harsh conditions and it has laughed off all challenges and continues to work without fault.This is an excellent product at an excellent price.