X-bit labs

Transcend 2.5” Portable Hard Disk Drive Review: Another External Drive with USB 2.0 Interface

Category: Storage

by Andrey Kuznetcov

[ 01/29/2004 | 09:45 AM ]

Need to move a lot of data around? Then you might want to consider buying an external HDD. We will test one of the external 2.5" storage solutions available in the today’s market: the cute and light Portable Hard Disk from Transcend. Read more about the performance of this 40GB model in our new review!

Table of contents:

• Closer Look: Transcend 2.5” Portable Hard Disk
  
• Closer Look: Shenzhen Luwen Electronics Co. Ltd. Storage Kingdom Easyharddisk
  
• Testbed and Methods
  
• Performance in Intel IOMeter Sequential Read and Write Patterns
  
• Performance in Intel IOMeter WorkStation Pattern
  
• Performance in WinBench99
  
• Performance in FC-Test
  
• Conclusion
  

Among the whole lot of diverse external storage devices intended for transportation of large data packs and supporting USB interface we could give a special place to 2.5” hard disk drives. They steadily occupy a niche in the today’s market, because they boast much higher storage capacity than any of the existing flash-drives, and at the same time they are smaller and lighter than any of the 3.5” external drives.

Wide spreading of USB 2.0 interface turned out a new stimulus for the manufacturers who started developing new solutions trying to win their spot under the sun. We can already buy new models of external 2.5” HDDs, which can work in Hi-Speed USB mode. Today we decided to test one of those solutions developed by Transcend Company. For a more illustrative and interesting test session we will also test one more solution, which we have already introduced to you in our article called Data Storing and Moving: Choose the Best Portable Device Now!. This time, however, we will run an extensive set of tests.

Closer Look: Transcend 2.5” Portable Hard Disk

The external drive, which I found in the box, impressed me a lot with its futuristic design. The silver plastic case is decorated with relief figures, which make the case look highly original and easy to recognize. The company name written on the upper part of the case also contributes to the recognizable design. Four small round “legs” at the bottom of the case made of some rubber-like material prevent this case from sliding off the table surface and reduce the vibrations during work. At the very edge of the upper side of the case there are two light-emitting diodes indicating the status of the product during work: they stand for power and data transfer. At the side of the case there are power supply and interface connectors.

The storage capacity of this drive is 40GB and it supports USB 2.0 interface. The manufacturer claims that this case allows using HDDs of up to 160GB storage capacity. I think these words suit mostly marketing purposes, because if this were true, then the ATA-USB bridge would have to support LBA48, so that they could overcome the 128GB barrier. Moreover, you all know that the maximum storage capacity of 2.5” HDDs is only 80GB, and it is still a big question how soon larger models are going to arrive.

The case size is 145x80x17mm and it weighs 105g (without the drive inside), so you will be able to easily install and remove the drive and have it with you in many situations.

Inside the package I found not only the hard disk drive, but also a small leather carry-bag, a USB cable, a power supply cable with PS/2 connector, miniature CD-disk with the drivers and a quick installation guide.

Getting a little bit ahead of time I would like to say that this solution had a Hitachi IC25N040ATCS04 HDD inside, which you can clearly see from the Device Manager screenshot above. Unfortunately, Travelstar 40GN HDDs developed by IBM have already become too outdated. They have very low spindle rotation speed of only 4,200rpm, 2MB buffer and the average seek time of 12ms.