Physically it’s very slick, coated in cool to the touch black aluminium and barely there branding. As with all other USB 3 drives it’s backwards compatible with USB 2 and also comes with a handy double-headed connection wire for both USB 3 and 2 connection, so you don’t need to remember to carry both types around with you.
As more companies bring external SSD drives out, it is will be sooner rather than later that speed will become much faster, performance increasing and prices coming down.
Overall the Iomega SSD Flash external drive looks great and performs as well as USB 3.0 will allow. Iomega was smart to include a top-tier performance SSD in the enclosure to ensure the interface would be the limiting factor. While it’s rugged, fast and has several other positives, it might be hard for some to look past the price. The 64 GB that was tested is roughly retails at AED920 while the 128GB is retailing at AED1650 with the top of the range 256GB going for approximately AED3210. Frankly the totals are closer than I thought, and when you tack on the warranty, included software and the fact that the drive is ready to go out of the box, I am not going to complain about the price. At the end of the day, for the target audience a product like this is more about solving a particular set of problems, and is less about trying to save a few bucks on a premium item.
Pros
· Well made enclosure
· Scores well even against SSDs connected over SATA
· High-quality SSD contained within
Cons
· USB 3.0 actually holds this drive back (more of a con for the interface, not the drive itself)
Bottom Line
The Iomega SSD Flash external drive is well made and ready to handle the abuse doled out by its users. Iomega used premium components throughout, including the SSD, to deliver a product that doesn’t compromise. While this isn’t going to be for everyone, for a certain audience the drive is a perfect fit and easy for us to recommend.
External hard drives with USB 3 have become an increasingly common sight in recent months, however Iomega?s offering stands out as it?s one of the few on the market that uses SSD technology, instead of a good, old fashioned mechanical disk.
