Speed limits?
Crystal DiskMark’s 1GB file-size tests certainly seem to suggest as much. The interface adapter is a huge bottleneck. Never mind reaching the C300’s true potential, neither the 64GB or the 128GB drives tested even approached anything close to Iomega’s projected figures.
Benchmark Tests
CrystalDiskMark 3
LaCie Rugged USB 3.0 hard drive shown to compare with SSD speeds
Longer bars are better
Now, for a buyer beware moment. Currently, the 64GB version has a known issue that cripples the write performance in these drives, amounting to about a throughput drop of around 30MB/s with large data chunks. Consequently, Iomega ended up sending me a 128GB drive unit for review which doesn't exhibit this drastic drop in speed.
Even so, the 128GB version fails to achieve its throughput claims and delivers a performance very much the same as Kingston’s HyperX max (also 128GB). It is quite possible that both of these products use the same controller for the interface adapter, hence the similar throttling apparent in the real-world speeds these drives manage.
Next page: Counting the cost
COMMENTS
Can we get more tests?
Say, same drive on USB2 as well as same contained SSD (what's inside this chassis) connected to eSATA and Firewire 800. Lets also see USB3 compared based on a common USB3 including chipset, a USB3 card in a 1x slot, and a USB3 card in a full performance PCI configuration.
In 90% of cases, USB3 is capped at PCI1x speed anyway, then add in controller, OS, and CPU overhead, and they perform at barely more (if at all) SATA speeds... Why pay so much more for USB 3 (and add yet another port), where eSATA is so close in speed as to be (in the near term) irrelevant, except for people moving TB at a time, which can;t be done with these small drives anyway....
All very nice
Thanks but I think I'll save the 650 sovs, buy a couple of 1TB traditional USB drives in small form factor and spend the rest on something fun for the the kids, like a new console!
Thanks anyway!
( 650 flipping quid for 256GB! Breathe in, breathe in slowly and calmly! )
That's 238.4GB
I still blame Iomega for claiming that 1MB=1,000,000 bytes, henceforth making it a de facto standard. Bastards, I'll never forgive them. That and the click of death. And the subsequent denial. And my 250GB drive dying. And my 750MB drive consistently killing my 250MB disks. It took me a while to learn my lesson, but I'll never buy from them again. Especially at this price!
aaah
zip drives. The only reason I will never buy iomega. No matter how cheap or fantastic. I have never forgiven you Iomega
/shakes fist as sky.
Gold Plated
For now its expensive, but then I imagine the same would have been said years and years ago with 5 inch HD's with under a gig of storage.
Wonder if it still works if someone drives over it in a tank
