SimpleTech SimpleDrive is quite a mouthful to say but it’s a pretty nice external hard drive that has plenty of perks. If you want a cheap reliable external that you can trust you data with then this might be the drive you are looking for. It has a decent software bundle that comes with the drive and you get 2GB of free online storage capacity. With an offer like that it will be hard to pass up this drive.
Right now the SimpleDrive only comes with the ability to connect via USB future versions are planned to offer USB and FireWire capability. The software that comes with the drive is easy to setup and even a novice can use the software. You can make simple backups of your system or data and you get a free online storage account with the software. The SimpleDrive is an easy surefire way to backup your data without any problems. Although the Seagate FreeAgent Pro might be a little more beefy in read and write times it only offers free online storage for a six month grace period, then you have to pay if you want to keep the storage space.
The SimpleDrive is a relatively nice looking external hard drive with a sleek design, in a black plastic case with blue accents. The body was designed by the legendary Pininfarina, who you might know as the designers of Ferraris. Not a big drive by any means measuring in at 8.25 inches long, 1.5 inches tall, and 5 inches wide. It has six sizes and comes in many different colors, but all have a large button mounted on the top, with a ring that tells you how much drive space you have left. With a 7,200 RPM hard drive powered by the USB port, you are sure to get good transfer speeds if you are using a USB 2.0 compliant port. You can also get a power adapter if your USB port isn’t enough to power the device, one you plug in the drive it is plug-and-play.
The six capacities that the SimpleDrive comes in are 160GB, 250GB, 320GB, 500GB, 750GB, and 1TB. The drive comes with some software that is preloaded (ArcSoft Total Media Backup and Record software) which you can install by opening the folder located in the drive and running the setup tool. ArcSoft Total Media gives you an easy to use interface for setting up backup profiles. You can schedule backup events as onetime or recurring what ever your needs might be. ArcSoft Total Media can only backup files and folders it can’t create a bootable backup of your operating system, you can use the software to burn CD’s and DVD’s (Windows users only).
The capacity meter gives you a good idea of what space you have left on the drive, each of the 4 sections represents 25% of the drive and lit sections represent available space. If you go below 10% capacity on the drive the ring will flash red when you first power it on, this can easily be over looked I think it should stay red once past 10% but oh well minor flaw.
With the drive I said you get 2GB of online storage, you can access this through an account with www.Myfabrik.com, an online storage service (SimpleTech is owned by Fabrik). If you need more than 2GB of online storage then you can purchase it for a mere 49 cents per gigabyte. You can upload content and view it anywhere you have the web.
The SimpleDrive worked relatively well with good read and write speeds, took me about 8 minutes to write a 10GB folder with mixed files to the drive. This should be fast enough for almost anyone’s needs. With the SimpleTech SimpleDrive you get a one year warranty nothing special but it might come in handy. I think this drive is decent overall, good speed, lots of storage space, and at a cheap price you can’t go wrong with this drive. You can check the drive out here at their website
You can find a SimpleDrive at Newegg or at Buy.com
