The is a portable and fast external drive with a single 2.5″ SSD inside. It is available in 256GB, 512GB and 1TB capacity options and ranges in price from $229 to $699. The aluminum design pairs nicely with the current line of MacBook models. It is small enough to stow just about anywhere, including your pocket. The aluminum serves double duty as an aesthetic choice and to disperse heat.

However, the drive gets uncomfortably hot to the touch when under heavy load – so don’t keep it in your pocket for video editing The StoreJet 500 features both Thunderbolt and USB 3.0 connectivity. Transcend includes both a USB 3.0 and a Thunderbolt cable with the drive. It is bus powered with either cable. Additionally, it includes a soft storage bag to protect the drive’s finish when on the go. Either connection is fast enough to deliver the claimed 440MB/s max read speed; however, I didn’t fully achieve that number with either connection. Using USB 3.0 and Thunderbolt connections across several different computers, the StoreJet 500 delivered a consistent write speed of around 290MB/s, which is plenty sufficient for transferring photo and video files.

By comparison, a spinning 7200RPM external hard drive will deliver about 115MB/s or so read speeds. Transcend StoreJet 500 Thunderbolt Speed Test As noted above, both USB 3.0 and Thunderbolt connections offer plenty of throughput to maintain the quoted 440MB/s read speeds. USB 3.0 can deliver sustained data transfer rates of 5Gb/s, which would max out at about 625MB/s read speeds.

Thunderbolt, on the other hand, offers double the data throughput at 10Gb/s, which equates to 1050MB/s read speeds. Accordingly, there is no throughput reason why USB 3.0 should be faster than the Thunderbolt connection.

Transcend Ssd Firmware

I can only guess that maybe this discrepancy is attributable to inefficiencies in the Thunderbolt controller of the StoreJet 500. The drive is formatted for Mac out of the box but can be reformatted to NTFS for use with Windows. It also includes Transcend Elite software, which allows you to use 256-bit AES file and folder encryption. Other than the discrepancy in the USB 3.0 and Thunderbolt write speeds, I think the Transcend StoreJet 500 is a great little external drive.

Unfortunately, the pricing is a bit high compared to Transcend’s own, which gives you a 500GB SSD for $213 (compared to $229 for a 256GB SSD in the StoreJet 500 line). Even Samsung’s tiny new offers a 500GB option for $299.99. The size and performance is right with the StoreJet 500 drives; however, the pricing doesn’t quite fit with other available options that deliver similar performance right now. You can find the Transcend StoreJet 500 drives. More info about the StoreJet 500 line is available.

. Pros Dual interface.

Comes with Thunderbolt and USB cables. Three-year warranty. Cons Similar throughput speeds for Thunderbolt and USB. Pricey when compared with USB-only drives.

No pass-through Thunderbolt port. Bottom Line The 2-terabyte Transcend Storejet 300 for Mac has both Thunderbolt and USB 3.0 interfaces, which can be convenient if all of your USB ports are occupied. But you'll pay for that flexibility. Most MacBooks (including MacBook Air and MacBook Pro models) come with solid state flash storage modules instead of the spinning hard drives found in older models. 256GB is a common capacity, but even the 512GB and 1TB models may not be enough for folks that wish to carry large media libraries with them.

The Transcend Storejet 300 for Mac ($188.99) adds an extra 2 terabytes of storage space to your Mac, with both Thunderbolt and USB 3.0 interfaces. While the flexibility is a plus over USB-only drives like our top pick, the, you'll have pay a premium for the privilege.

Transcend Ssd 256gb Storejet For Macbook Pro

Because the Storejet is so compact, it lacks a pass-through Thunderbolt port for daisy chaining other drives or displays. That's not a problem for Mac desktops or MacBook Pros with two Thunderbolt 2 ports, but may be an issue on MacBook Air laptops that only have one.

The drive comes pre-formatted HFS+, so it will work with your Macs running and Apple Time Machine right out of the box. You'll need to reformat it for use with a Windows PC.

A fairly comprehensive Mac- and Windows-compatible hard drive utility can be downloaded from Transcend's website, and includes backup, encryption, file sync, and file restore functions. The drive comes with a three-year warranty, same as the Western Digital My Passport Ultra, and one year longer than the Seagate Backup Plus Portable.

Pricing and Performance The drive's 2TB capacity is enough for about 500 1080p HD movies, and/or thousands of pictures and MP3 files. At the current $188.99 price, that works out to $0.09 per gigabyte. In contrast, the Canvio Connect II ($0.06 per gigabyte), My Passport Ultra ($0.07 per gigabyte), and Seagate Backup Plus Portable ($0.04 per gigabyte) are better values. The Backup Plus Portable also has twice the storage space for less money overall. The StoreJet 300 is only available in the 2-terabyte size.

The Thunderbolt interface gives you more flexibility, but its performance is almost exactly the same as the USB 3.0. Copying our 1.2GB test folder took 11 seconds on both Thunderbolt and USB 3.0. Likewise, running the Blackmagic drive test resulted in an identical 124.1MBps read throughput for both interfaces, while the write throughput on the same test differed by a miniscule amount (124.1MBps on USB 3.0; 123.8MBps on Thunderbolt). That's a bit faster than the throughput results we got on the Akitio ThunderGo on USB 3.0 (107.6MBps read; 107.4MBps write), but far behind solid state drives (SSDs) like the, which was faster than 350MBps for write and 425MBps for read operations via the USB 3.0 interface. Since performance is limited by the spinning hard drive, neither interface has an advantage over the other when copying files to or from the Storejet 300. The Transcend Storejet 300 is an easy and flexible way to add 2TB of hard drive storage to your Mac. It's especially useful if you've already filled your MacBook Air or Pro's USB ports, and still have the Thunderbolt port free.

However, because of the Storejet's price premium, we'd still pick the Seagate Backup Plus Portable Drive for its 4TB capacity at almost $40 less.