Best External SSD in India 2021 (Portable Solid State Drive) – [Reviews]

When it comes to the difference between HDD and SSD, each of them has its benefits. The HDDs are Hard Disk Drives that come with moving or rotating parts, and the SSD is Solid State Drives that made without any moving parts. 

HDD:

The HDDs are Hard Disk Drives which are much cheaper than the SSD drives. Usually, the HDDs are bulky and come with a lot of moving parts in it. Because of the moving parts and their size, they are not much preferred to carry them along. They come useful only if you are choosing additional storage or a backup to your CPU. 

Compared to the SSDs, the transfer rates in HDDs are slow, yet it can store more data than the SSDs. 

SSDs :

SSDs, on the other hand, are Solid State Drives which come without any moving parts. The SSDs are a new generation of disk drives which uses flash-based memory. These are replacing the traditional mechanical hard disks. Their efficiency and portability make them work much faster.

Many new SSDs come at a transfer rate not less than 500MB per second, which can not be achieved by the traditional hard disks. The SSDs are packed in a compact body which and takes less power emitting low heat, and are also immune to magnetic fields.

Well, coming to the external and internal SSD, there are slightly few difference in both. 

Internal SSD:

The internal SSD is one that comes inside your Laptop or PC. While comparing with the External SSDs, the internal SSDs are a bit slower. The internal SSDs are much more like Hard Disc drives built into your PC, but they are faster than the HDDs.

External SSD:

The external SSD, on the other hand, comes with different connectivity. Most of the recent SSDs these days come with USB 3.0 connecters that increase the bit transfer speed. 

Storage is one more essential thing you need to consider before getting an external hard disk. These storage requirements are different for different people, as follows.

For Photographers

If you are a photographer or owns a studio, there will be much need for these external devices for you than any other user. Photographers need to handle a large amount of data, and also there will be the necessity of connecting storage devices to computers and even cameras. 

An SSD of 500 GB will be hard enough if you are a photographer on criteria that you clear your trash images timely. For storage purposes of high-resolution photographs, you may also opt the 1TB drives. 

For Video Editing:

If you are a video editing professional, you advised opting an SSD drive. These SSDs are incredibly capable of handle large amount of data and as said earlier transfer rates are high in SSDs, which will help you majorly.

For video editing purposes a 1TB SSDs will be perfectly enough. You can also prefer 500GB drives as the main purpose of video editors may not be storage but to transfer data from systems or to clients. 

For Gaming or Playstation, Xbox one:

Most of the gaming laptops and PlayStations do not come with HardDisk more than 512GB while many of them only 256GB. And as gamers, we hate to delete the existing games for new ones. For situations like this, the External SSDs will come in aid. Considering a 500GB to 1TB external hard disk to store your games will help you the most.

Because of the speed of the SSDs, adapting them for your gaming laptops and gaming monitors will help you play your games smoothly and fast.

For Storing photos:

If you wish to store photos and digital files, an external SSD will always come in aid. For optimized resolution photos, you do not even need to have more storage too. If your Photos are larger and high-resolution ones, you can opt for an SSD that ranges from 500GB to 1TB. In either way, the SSD will be the right choice because of its robustness. 

For Long term backup:

When you prefer an external drive for your backup, SSD will be the right choice. The hard disk drives even though they are capable of storing more data, they are not reliable and may break out early. Whereas these SSDs have a longer life, and also they do not need extra care. 

For Mac / PC / Laptop / Mobile Phones:

For your Mac or PC, an additional SSD is always an asset. The PCs or Mac may break down any time, causing the internal drives to lose all the data stored in it. Hence backing up your data in an external SSD will help you recover your data whenever you need it. 

The data transfer rate is one of the essential features you need to know before getting an external SSD. Even if your SSD has the storage capacity and comes with all the features, if the data transfer rate is less, then the device will be of no use to you. 

The Data Transfer rate depends on two aspects, Read and Write. The Read aspect is said to work when the data stored in your SSD is either being copied to your PC or accessed by your PC. The Write aspect is said to work when data from your PC or Mac is being stored on your SSD. 

A typical Hard Disk Drive can perform the read and write operations at a max speed of 125MB/s. Whereas in the SDDs the transfer rate in a standard one will be over 500MB/s.

The additional feature you get along with your external SSD are the type of connectors and the compatibility.

Connectors

Connectors play an essential role in the speed and compatibility of devices. One thing before knowing about the connectors is that you should not get confused with the USB versions (USB 2.0,3.0 so on) with the types of connectors (Type A, B, C).

• USB 2.0,3.0, 3.1, 3.2;

There is no significant difference between USB 2.0 and 3.0. Both of them look alike except for the color (USB 3.0 comes in blue color), and when compared to USB 2.0, the USB 3.0 gives faster data transfer rates and has better power management techniques. Major of the recent devices come with 3.0 ports, and these will also connect with 2.0 USB devices. 

After 3.0 invented in 2008, the data transfer rates through USB increased. Later on, these are updated to 3.1 (also called as 3.1 gen 2) with a double in the data transfer rate of 10GB/s. Later in 2017, 3.2 USB invented over the Type C interface, which increased the data transfer rates of up to 20GB/s/.

• Thunderbolt bolt1 and 2

ThunderBolt is way faster than the USB. Thunderbolt 2 is capable of handling data speeds as a USB 3.1. The latest version of ThunderBolt that is ThunderBolt 3 works at 40GB/s, which is twice as faster as USB 3.2. The thunderBolt is not that popular in the market, yet you can see some devices like MAC using the ThunderBolt cables.

Compatible devices

The compatibility of the devices entirely depends on the types of Connecters adopted to the USB ports. 

The available USB port you have seen in many electronic devices would be the USB Type-A. On the HDD drive, a common type of USB comes with USB Micro-B. Only a few of the SSDs come with the Micro-B USB type. All the latest connector types include the Type-C of USB 3.0 which is faster.