Seagate Pocket Hard Drive Review

[Brian]

Seagate Pocket Hard Drive with a Kiss for scale (view large image)

Flash memory has dropped in price over the years, while capacities have continued to increase, but high capacity flash RAM remains very expensive. Seagate has a portable alternative that might appeal to users who need more storage, but still want a small, universal form factor. Their hockey-puck style hard drives come in 2.5GB and 5GB sizes, the latter selling for roughly $100, not bad for that much portable storage.

Seagate Pocket Drive Specs

• Dimensions - 0.71" H x 3.03" D
• Weight -- 2.2 ounces
• Available in 2.5GB and 5GB sizes, 6GB coming soon
• 3600 RPM, 2MB cache, 1" drive
• USB 2.0 compatible with PC and MAC (up to 480 Mbps)
• Sequential read/write performance: 4 MB/sec to 7 MB/sec (typical)
• Drive shell absorbs shock, protecting the hard drive
• Powered over USB
• Built-in USB cable
• Password protection (Windows only)
• One year warranty on parts and labor

Pocket Drive Setup and Use

The pocket drive rotates to reveal a USB plug with about six inches of cord. The drive is automatically detected under Windows XP, so even though Seagate includes a disk with drivers and tools, it shouldn't be needed unless you wipe the contents of the drive and want the management tools back.

Drive with cord extended (view large image)

Once connected to a host computer a blue light in the center of the disk will light up showing the connection has been made. It will light again on read/write access. At the conclusion of using the drive, the cord winds back up, with the USB adaptor protected under the Pocket Drive's case.

USB cord clips into place and rotates into the shell (view large image)

At 3600 RPM, the drive is slower than even the lowest-end 4200RPM notebook drives. That's part of the give and take though as you scale down the drive size. Even though it sounds slow, in practical terms it's not that bad. I transferred a directory of family pictures from my computer to the Pocket Drive that included 1,334 files and 2.1GB in 14 minutes.

Drive in use (view large image)

For a smaller, more practical test, I copied over a ripped music CD containing 22 files for a total of 102MB. The copy to the Pocket Drive took 35 seconds. By way of comparison, the same files were copied to a USB flash drive in 22 seconds, about 60% faster. Playing the music files through Windows Media Player worked perfectly with both the Pocket Drive and USB flash drive though.

HD Tune results (view large image)

This takes us to the crux of the benefit analysis for the Pocket Drive. You're going to give up raw speed when it comes to file transfers, but you're going to gain in the space per dollar ratio and Seagate has bundled together a few nice tools to manage the drive. Similar tools may or may not come on USB flash drives, depending on who makes them.

Drive management software (view large image)

Conclusion

Seagate has done a nice job of providing a large amount of storage in a form factor that's visually pleasing and somewhat ruggedized. There's no setup required and if you want advanced tools like boot disk creation, partitioning and drive security, the Pocket Drive has a lot to offer. If you need a high capacity drive that fits nicely in a pocket, the Seagate Pocket Drive is a fantastic option. At $100 for the 5GB model it's hard to go wrong.

Pros:

• Easily pocketable
• Built in USB cable
• Powered over USB
• Good accompanying software

Cons:

• Slow transfer speeds

Purchase Info:

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[Andrew Baxter]

say that's pretty cool, it's bigger than a flash drive of course but way cheaper for the higher memory capacity. and if you look, the price differential between the 2.5GB and 5GB is like $20 so you'd be smart to pay the extra otherwise at 2.5GB you'd probably be able to find a flash drive for a close/similar price.

I wonder how well it doubles as a hockey puck? might be good for the odd game of hockey on the kitchen linoleum floor.

[Charles P. Jefferies]

Not a bad price at all for the 5GB model.

A 2GB flash stick costs about ~$48-55 on Newegg, and then the 4GB versions are ~$110+.

I'd sacrafice the transfer speed for space . . not like you're using the drive all the time.

Nice job Brian, great pictures.

[fudgy]

Couldn't one just get a 2.5" enclosure and a 60GB drive for about the same price? You would sacrifice size for 12 times the space and a boost in performance.

[coriolis]

They should have a cuter name for it heh...

[Chutsman]

Gotta agree with Fudgy ... that's where I will throw my money.

[aldem]

Like mentioned above, with flash memory (cards/sticks) prices falling down dramatically dont see any benefit to buy something like this, cuople years ago, yes, but not anymore. It is very close to become obsolete.

[MysticGolem]

flash drives all the way...im gonna buy a 4-6gb flash drive when i get my laptop in 3 months or so.

Right now the biggest flash drive usb key is 4gb, i want 6gb so i can put a full DVD on it and more.

But if nothing comes out by then, i may just get a 4gb flash drive 3 months from now, and then get a 6-8gb usbkey if they make em 1 year later.

Thanks for the nice read!

Thanks,

MysticGolem

[Brian]

Well, it's still cheaper than a large capacity CF card and USB sticks. As to a portable 2.5" drive, sure, you can go that route, but it's larger and you have to carry additional cables. This is a self-contained unit. Not for everyone for sure, but there's definitely a market for such a device.

[polish_jr]

I just don't now why they put an HDD in there. Why not just put a 5 one-gig flash memory chips into one enclosure. No moving parts, faster speeds.