portable hard drives for mac and windows

#Portable hard drives for mac and windows portable

Beyond that simple statement, the story gets confusing-largely because of the plethora of variations: USB 3.0, USB 3.1 Gen 1 (5Gbps, which is basically USB 3.0), USB 3.1 Gen 2 (10Gbps), and USB 3.1 Gen 2×2 (20Gbps), and now USB 3.2 and USB4. The vast majority of external drives today are USB drives. Remember, if you’re storing important data, you need a backup-online, or if the data is copious, on a second drive. Save your pennies and get one, or two of the larger drives. You may also need the extra space eventually.Īs you can see in the chart above, while the $50/1TB is the most affordable initially, it’s by far the worst deal in terms of cost per TB/GB.

The 1TB drive may seem like the best deal, but in terms of price per gigabyte, the 4TB and 5TB drives are far better deals. Keep in mind, this is one drive on one day (May 13, 2021), and just one vendor, Amazon, but it illustrates the point.

#Portable hard drives for mac and windows portable

In fact, dollar for dollar, cheaper low-capacity drives are most often the worst deal.įor example, we compared prices of the WD My Passport portable drive in its 1TB, 2TB, 4TB, and 5TB capacities. However, while you might think that the lowest-cost drive provides the most value, it often doesn’t. Capacity and priceįor most consumers, the main shopping concerns for external storage are capacity and price. Yes, USB4 will provide the same massive throughput as Thunderbolt 3 (with more possibly to come), though without some of the latter’s features, such as daisy-chaining. What you need to know before you buy USB Forum