I’ve been looking for a way to shift data around for a while. I’ve seen various people use various methods. Some use one of those USB key-ring drives, which seem appealing, due to their size. However they are pretty limited in terms of space, so for shifting pictures and documents around they are fine, but not much good for the large amounts of data I’ve been looking to move occasionally.

The other alternative I have seen is the portable hard drive. I’ve actually got a couple of these anyway, one of which is used for backups, the other holds our pictures and MP3 library, and is hooked up to the Mac permanently. These have much more storage capacity, but need an external power supply, and are pretty bulky. I’ve seen smaller portable versions based on a 2.5 inch drive, which can be powered from the USB port on a computer.

However last week I came across a drive that is even smaller, based on a 1.8“ drive. Again it’s powered off the USB port, but size wise it’s area is barely larger than a regular credit card – you can see the size compared to a regular keyboard in the pictures. It also comes with a nice case, and is enclosed in a nice red aluminium casing that is used to dissipate the heat. Although not as small as a flash drive it’s still really portable. The capacity is not as high as some of the bigger drives, but the basic sized drive that I ordered is still 40gb, which is more than enough for my portable storage needs, even enough to take a copy of Visual Studio!

I bought the drive from Storage Depot, a local company based in Wokingham, although amusingly thanks to the postman we ended up having to drive to Reading to collect it. Incidentally, it’s not even the smallest drive they do, there is an even smaller form factor drive, but with much more limited capacity. They also have a nice article comparing the various drive sizes, complete with picture, which is useful if you’re in the market for an external drive.