ToughDrive -ThumbDrive for USB 2.0
reviewed by Robert Pritchett
ATP, Inc. PO Box 641651 San Jose, CA 95164-1651 1-408-732-5000 or 1-877-ATP-6900 http://flash.atpinc.com/products/view.php?product_id=1178 Released: September 29, 2005 $40 USD for the 256MB version, $60 USD for 512MBG, $90 USD for 1GB and $150 USD for 2GB. (4GB? HavenÍt found one yet.) Requirements: Powered USB 2.0 port. Comes with: Lanyard, Quick User Guide in English French and Spanish; and the drive. FAQs: http://flash.atpinc.com/articles/view.php?article_id=1006 Strengths: Cross-platform, including Linux. 5-year warranty. Solid-state SIP technology. Waterproof. Dust proof. ESD proof. Shock-resistant. 10-year data retention. Hot-pluggable. No driver needed for Linux kernel 2.4.0 or later, Mac OS 8.6 or later or Win2000 or later. Weaknesses: Needs a powered USB port. Password protection only for Windows systems. Other Reviews: Don Lee ñcrash-dummiedî his unit and it took the abuse. http://peripherals.consumerelectronicsnet.com/articles/viewarticle.jsp?id=36223 http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=344&num=1 Reviewed a 1 GB unit with iMac G5 and Mac OS X 10.4.7. |
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The ToughDrive comes with a velvety, ribbed, rubberized shell (DuraSkin) and a little black lanyard. The USB port cover is not velvetized. When the ToughDrive is plugged into a powered USB port, a blue indicator light is on and blinks while it is being accessed or loaded to. With my machine the password-protection software for non-Mac environments is in a folder instead of a separate partition like the Petito we looked at last month.
So is it macho? It apparently can handle the abuse according to the other reviews listed above. It isnÍt much larger than the first two joints of a manÍs middle finger; 75 mm x 21 mm x 11 mm.
The warranty period is two years and the insertion rate is 100,000 cycles. Since it is solid-state, it is shock resistant (physically) as well as ESD (electrostatic discharge), dust and water-proof.
Data transfer is 30 MB per second on a 2.0 port for download (read) and 20 MB per second for upload (write).
The USB cap is smoother than the DuraSkin body for some reason, but it looks like it is the same material. Gee, you know, they really could do a color-scheme for the military market. It looks like it very well could be the exact same internals as the Petito, since the specs are the same.
With the ToughDrive in a USB port, it appears as NO NAME. And it doe stake a little bit of time to port over 1 GB of files, but instead of 12 hours, no, 5 hours, no,1 hour, no 30 minutes, no, done, it gets the files transferred rather quickly as Mac OS X recalculates how long it takes to do transfers. It may be hot-swappable, but Mac OS X doesnÍt like having a drive unceremoniously yanked, so Ejecting it is better.
I wouldnÍt suggest, if you are ñ007î, that you drop it out a 60-story window hoping it survives the drop, but it is solid-state, so it might bounce a few stories back up and land fine, since it is made mostly of rubber. Just remember it is abuse ñresistantî and not abuse-proof, okay?
