Thunderbolt drives continue trickle out at a snail’s pace, but Lacie’s latest USB 3.0 Mac specific drives should quench the thirst of those itching for fast external storage.
The new drives include Lacie’s RuggedKey thumb drive, Rugged Triple hard disk, and the Porsche Designed P’ 9223 and P’ 9233. All of the drives feature Lacie's second generations USB 3.0 technology “USB Attached SCSI Protocol” which interfaces with Mac’s running Lion and Mountain Lion for optimum data transfer speeds.
The Porsche designed drives can transfer a 700MB file in just under 7 seconds according Lacie and features a 5mm solid aluminum casing. The brushed-metal finish and simplicity match Apple’s litany of devices perfectly. The Porsche drives come in 2TB ($159) and 3TB ($199) flavors, but the 2TB option is currently “out of stock.”
Lacie’s RuggedKey USB drive comes in 16GB ($39) and 32GB ($69) capacities. The price premium is likely a result of the “Ruggedness” of the USB drives which can withstand a 100 meter fall, water damage, as well as extreme cold and heat. Lacie applies the same premium to their Rugged Triple USB 3.0 drives which come in 500GB and 1TB capacities.
Lacie has Thunderbolt drives, and RAID arrays, but they come at a premium with the Little Big Disk costing up to $749 (240GB SSD) if you want to take advantage of Thunderbolt like speeds. The Lacie 2big series ($599 for 4TB and $749 for 6TB) allows for more space, but sacrifices speed because of the non-SSD drives. Lacie's new USB 3.0 drives give the more budget conscious Mac user in need of storage space a few new stylish and fast drives that won’t break the bank.
Source: Lacie [via Engadget]
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