Stuff - UK (2020-01)

104

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Learning

to drive

The best SSDs have

all the attributes of

eating-challenge

guru Adam Richman:

speed and capacity in

a fairly compact form

factor. They need to

be tough too, as they

will be bundled in a

backpack half the

time. Around 500GB

should do unless you

hoard uncompressed

videos, photos or

music, in which case

it’s time to enter the

terabyte zone.

O Get this: WD My

Passport Go 500GB

£90 / western

digital.com

Casual

specs

In an ever-decreasing

world of built-in

storage, buying an

external SSD can

be a cost-effective

way of increasing

capacity rather

than speccing up

a machine from the

maker. You’ll pay

£200 for an extra

128GB of storage on

a MacBook Air, but

you can find a 500GB

SSD for under £100.

Even iPads support

external storage now.

O Get this: SanDisk

Extreme Portable

SSD 250GB

£70 / sandisk.com

Rude

mechanicals

It’s the equivalent

of picking Graeme

Souness over

Raheem Sterling,

but opting for a

slower, mechanical

hard-disk drive

(HDD) still has

its advantages.

SSDs cost a lot more

per GB, and can be

just too expensive

for 2TB or more.

For large files or

long-term storage

rather than everyday

use, an HDD is still

a great option.

O Get this: Seagate

Expansion 2TB

£70 / seagate.com

Stick it

to ’em

Forget Grandmaster

Flash carting crates

of vinyl about: these

days DJs can rock

up at a club carrying

nothing but a USB

stick storing masses

of music. They’re not

much different to an

SSD, with both using

flash memory – it’s

merely about form

factor and capacity.

So while you’re

unlikely to find one

holding more than

256GB, they can be

super-handy.

O Get this: Kingston

DataTraveler G4 128GB

£13 / kingston.com

Memory

cards

Plenty of phones and

cameras can expand

their built-in storage

with an SD memory

card. These slide into

a slot and work as

an ultra-small flash

drive. Just check the

size for compatibility.

O Get this: Samsung

Evo Plus 128GB

£36 / samsung.com

SANDISK IXPAND

WIRELESS CHARGER

from £55 / amazon.co.uk

Place your phone on this

Qi-enabled charger and it’ll

automatically back up photos

and videos.

ISTORAGE DISKASHUR 2

from £129 / istorage-uk.com

The DiskAshur has decent

levels of digital encryption,

plus a physical keypad so

users have to enter a PIN to

access its files.

HOW TO BUY

A STORAGE

DEVICE

If you don’t trust the

internet, hop off the

cloud and let’s get

physical with some

real data hardware

MIND THE STORE SATURDAY SUPERSTORE

OR TRY

ONE OF

THESE...

1 2 3 4 5

TOP TENS HOW TO BUY

JARGON

BUSTER

SSD

Solid-state drives

have now mostly

replaced hard drives,

both in PCs and

externally.

Flash memory

This holds data

electronically without

movable parts, so it’s

less vulnerable to

damage.

USB 3.0

To move files as fast

as an SSD can read

and write them, go for

USB-C, USB 3.0 or

Thunderbolt 3.