WESTERN DIGITAL MY BOOK STUDIO EDITION II

Zippy, Voluminous External Storage



I really liked the Western Digital My Book Mirror Edition, which yokes two 1TB hard drives together to provide a terabyte of mirrored (RAID 1) storage. Think of the Western Digital My Book Studio Edition II as the Mirror Edition's fraternal twin. But while the Mirror Edition emphasizes protected storage, the Studio Edition II is all about speed and capacity. It's just the thing for video-heavy creative types who would enjoy having 2T8 of transportable storage by their desktops. It's Mac-friendly out of the box, though it will work with Windows PCs, too. In terms of dollars per GB, this is more expensive than a single-mechanism drive, but it's cheaper than a portable drive.

Within its case, the Studio Edition II has the same pair of Green Power mi hard drives as the Mirror Edition, and as with that product, the user can replace one of the Studio Edition II's drives if it fails. The Studio Edition II comes formatted for HFS+ (Mac format) and with RAID 0. (You can reformat to FAT32 or MIS if you like.) This means it can fully support the faster FireWire 800 and eSATA interfaces.

The Studio Edition II proved speedy on our test MacBook, taking only 49 seconds to copy our 1.2GB test folder via USB, 38 seconds via FireWire 400, and 32 seconds with FireWire 800. If all you need is a secure, protected place to store your backups, then get the (slightly) cheaper Mirror Edition. But if you have a home business or other small business or are a graphics professional, the Studio Edition II should float to the top of your buy list.—Joel Santo Domingo



PC Magazine April 2009

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LENOVO THINKPAD USB PORTABLE SECURE DRIVE

Lockable, Portable Hard Drive




Drive security is getting to be a hot-button issue; witness the recent story about a lost M1)3 player with military data on it being resold in a pawn shop. The problem with so-called "secure" hard drives has traditionally been that they have too many limitations. This Lenovo external drive transcends those limitations by internalizing its security—it looks just like a plain old hard drive to Windows or Mac OS X. It's hardware-encrypted (with 128-hit AES) and easy to use—what more could you as for?

At first glance, the 0.5-by-3.5-by-4.5-inch (I-IWD), 320GB Secure Drive looks like a USB numeric keypad. An LED indicator tells you the drive's status, and the casing is clad in the same rubberized coating that gives Lenovo's Think Pad notebooks their distinctive and sturdy feel. You can add up to ten users (in addition to the administrator),each with a unique access code. That way, the drive can be passed from person to person while remaining secure, with each user having access to all the data on it.



In testing, the Secure Drive scored very well on PCMark05, turning in 3,126—exceptional for an external storage drive. It was also fast in simple dragand-drop copying, taking only 52 seconds to transfer our 1.2GB test folder. 'lb he sure, FireWire and eSATA drives have the potential to be faster, but the Secure Drive pays no performance penalties for its security. At about $0.68/GB, the drive is a bit pricey. You can get a nonprotected 500GB drive for the same total price as the Secure Drive (about $0.44/ GB). But for its target audience, the extra security is worth the money. If you're a businessperson who needs to pass sensitive data physically from one computer to another, or it you want to back up your files with another layer of security, the Secure Drive is a perfect choice.- Joel Santo Domingo

PC Magazine April 2009

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