What's the best external 1tb SSD for around £100

[strath44]

Hi folks, I'm looking for an external drive of at least 1tb, don't want to spend much more than £100 but will go a bit higher to get something a bit more reliable. I was looking at Lacie Rugged Minis but then thought I should be getting something SSD as I'm guessind they are more reliable and less prone to damage when moving about????

Is the likes of this any good -

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Intenso-External-SSD-Prem...

Thanks for any input

[sparkyhx]

Personally I'd pay more and get a recognised brand, but thats me.

too many tales, albeit a few years ago of high capacity chinese SD cards that looked like they were as advertised (free space), but when you actually tried to fill them up they were a fraction of the size quoted.

Edited by sparkyhx on Wednesday 18th November 11:21

[Jinx]

One of these:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Crucial-CT1000P1SSD8-Soli...

+

one of these:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/ORICO-2139U3-TCM2-BK/dp/B...

Gives you best speeds and should be rugged enough.

[Stuart70]

Got a couple of Seagate drives as back up for photograph collection

All been good so far... after about a year. I took 2 back ups on different drives as I was not entirely comfortable with their reliability. That comment is not Seagate specific.

[strath44]

Jinx said:

One of these:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Crucial-CT1000P1SSD8-Soli...

+

one of these:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/ORICO-2139U3-TCM2-BK/dp/B...

Gives you best speeds and should be rugged enough.

Thanks thats a good shout did wonder about that route!

I saw a really good slightly more heavy duty case on amazon yesterday but came across it by accident and can't find it now!!!

[camel_landy]

Jinx said:

One of these:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Crucial-CT1000P1SSD8-Soli...

+

one of these:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/ORICO-2139U3-TCM2-BK/dp/B...

Gives you best speeds and should be rugged enough.

Ta muchly... I've just been doing some similar research and that has just hit the nail on the head.

M

[Jinx]

strath44 said:

Thanks thats a good shout did wonder about that route!

I saw a really good slightly more heavy duty case on amazon yesterday but came across it by accident and can't find it now!!!

Be careful of the NVME key - fastest drives are M-Key and these enclosures tend to cost more. The cheaper B or B&M key are normally SATA rather than PCIE speeds and are not compatible.

[strath44]

looking around can anyone see any issues with this case?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/ElecGear-Protective-Enclo...

also is there and advantages over the PCIm2 v 2.5" ssds?

2.5" rugged!? case-

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07D26MQ4D/ref...

[Jinx]

strath44 said:

looking around can anyone see any issues with this case?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/ElecGear-Protective-Enclo...

also is there and advantages over the PCIm2 v 2.5" ssds?

2.5" rugged!? case-

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07D26MQ4D/ref...

PCIe M2 is faster than SATA (or M2 SATA) and that first case looks pretty good.

[strath44]

Thanks Jinx very much appreciated, one other question - sorry..........

I'm buying this as I need to back up a lot of photos and videos from my work to work from home if I suddenly write a few hundered gb to the drive will it create issues? I saw something called TBW mentioned and was trying to understand it from the article below.

https://blog.westerndigital.com/ssd-endurance-spee...

Going with the first case, any other 1tb ssds that you could recommend that are a bit cheaper?

[Jinx]

strath44 said:

Thanks Jinx very much appreciated, one other question - sorry..........

I'm buying this as I need to back up a lot of photos and videos from my work to work from home if I suddenly write a few hundered gb to the drive will it create issues? I saw something called TBW mentioned and was trying to understand it from the article below.

https://blog.westerndigital.com/ssd-endurance-spee...

Heat will cause the drive to slow down when writing to the drive - but the heat sink on the enclosure you linked to looked heavy enough. The Crucial drive l linked to has an endurance of 200TB Total Bytes Written (TBW), approximately 109GB per day for 5 years (according to the specs)
So should be good enough (given the price) .

Edited to add - wait for Black Friday - either Crucial or Sabrent drives would be a good choice (outside of the more expensive samsung evos).

[strath44]

Thanks for the great help!

I did see the circa 100gb PD edurance speeds being kicked about and I know that I've got one folder with at least 200gb in it so wondered if that would cause issues but understand now!

[mmm-five]

strath44 said:

Hi folks, I'm looking for an external drive of at least 1tb, don't want to spend much more than £100 but will go a bit higher to get something a bit more reliable. I was looking at Lacie Rugged Minis but then thought I should be getting something SSD as I'm guessind they are more reliable and less prone to damage when moving about????

Is the likes of this any good -

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Intenso-External-SSD-Prem...

Thanks for any input

I'd stay away from that as it must be the slowest SSD for sale.

Didn't see it asked, but what connection are you using? USB 3.0, 3.1, 3.2 (or one of their latest naming conventions), with a USB-A port or USB-C port?

I only ask as it's not worth paying for a very fast enclosure & 5000mbps m.2 SSD if you can only take advantage of a 500mbps SATA SSD.

For example:

• USB 3.2 Gen 1 (previously referred to as USB 3.0, or formally as USB 3.1 Gen 1) has a 5Gbps (or about 550Mbps with transmission overheads) transfer rate and is officially known by the marketing name SuperSpeed USB.
• USB 3.2 Gen 2 (previously referred to as USB 3.1, or formally as USB 3.1 Gen 2) has a 10Gbps (or about 1100Mbps with transmission overheads)transfer rate and is now officially known as SuperSpeed USB 10Gbps.
• USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 (the latest spec) has a 20Gbps (or about 2200Mbps with transmission overheads) transfer rate and is now officially known as SuperSpeed USB 20Gbps.

Edited by mmm-five on Wednesday 18th November 15:29

[mikef]

Or thunderbolt 3, if you are a Mac or high-end PC user?

I'm using a £90 1TB Sabrent NVMe drive in an OWC envoy express external TB3 housing ($60 on pre-order) and getting 1,500 MBS read/write speeds on a MacBook Pro

[mmm-five]

mikef said:

Or thunderbolt 3, if you are a Mac or high-end PC user?

I'm using a £90 1TB Sabrent NVMe drive in an OWC envoy express external TB3 housing ($60 on pre-order) and getting 1,500 MBS read/write speeds on a MacBook Pro

That's what I've got too - but didn't realise it was limited to 1500Mbps when I ordered it, so the SSD (a £75 1TB WD Blue) in there is a bit under-utilised....glad I didn't go for the 980 Pro, WD Black, or Sabrent Rocket (I've kept those for my gaming PC)

Still very happy with it for the price...even taking into account that it's not backwards compatible with USB3 via the USB-C/TB port as it doesn't have the controller.

Edited by mmm-five on Wednesday 18th November 18:20

[mikef]

Yeah, that's the reason I went for a fairly basic Sabrent drive. I does what it says on the tin though (literally, the drive comes in a tin...)

[Big Rig]

I’ve got a Samsung T7 in my basket on Amazon. Hoping they might drop a bit on Friday, doubt it though. Gets great reviews, 1TB £160 currently though.

[Skyedriver]

Stuart70 said:

Got a couple of Seagate drives as back up for photograph collection

All been good so far... after about a year. I took 2 back ups on different drives as I was not entirely comfortable with their reliability. That comment is not Seagate specific.

I've 2 Seagates and just bought another for my son.

[Big Rig]

Samsung T7 external SSD 1TB £109 down from £200.

I've just ordered 2.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B087DDP3L1/ref=twister...

[mikef]

Were there other colours than red at that price when you ordered? Silver and blue seem to still be £160

Ordered one, but I've risked not including expert installation at £59.29

Edited by mikef on Sunday 22 November 08:42