SanDisk - 8TB Desk Drive USB Type-C Desktop External SSD - black

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The vast majority of our reviews come from verified purchases. Reviews from customers may include My Best Buy members, employees, and Tech Insider Network members (as tagged). Select reviewers may receive discounted products, promotional considerations or entries into drawings for honest, helpful reviews.

• Rated 5 out of 5 stars

  smart buy for portable users

  • Incentivized
  • Verified Purchaser

  lightweigth, fast and compact, easy to travel with.

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  Posted 1 month ago by Ariel

• Rated 5 out of 5 stars

  Good value for high capacity storage & high speed

  • Tech Insider Network Member

  At about 4” x 4”, a height of 1.5”, and 13.7oz weight (with cable and power adapter), the SanDisk Desk Drive is actually portable if you need it to be. Its small footprint takes up little space on a desk or work environment. The 12V power adapter is relatively slim at 2.5” x 1” x 1.5” (2.25” with the non-retractable prongs). The cable length of the power adapter is 5.5’. The length of the USB-C cable is 3’ 3”. With the USB-A adapter it comes to 3’ 4.5”. Full disclosure: The adapter that came with mine was defective which caused the speeds of the drive to be dramatically slow (44MB/s read and writes instead of 1000MB/s). I don’t know how prevalent my issue is, but if you experience the same, exchange your drive at the place of purchase or contact SanDisk and they will replace it under its limited 3 year warranty. The USB cable is pretty rigid, which is normal with high-speed cables such as this USB 3.2 Gen 2 cable, so you’ll need 2.5” of clearance space between the connection and an obstruction like a wall or the back of a desk. You might be able to flex the cable down to 2” of clearance, but I’d worry about the damaging of the cable at that point. The bottom of the Desk Drive has a silicone feeling base that does a decent job of keeping the drive in place on a flat surface. It’s more likely to slip on laminated surfaces when the cable is tugged on but it’s still able to establish a grip and it’s nothing terrible. Since the Desk Drive uses an SSD the drive has no moving parts. There is zero vibration and no noise while it is in operation, which tells me it’s probably not using a fan for cooling. I suspect it’s just using a heatsink, which probably accounts for most of the drive’s height and weight. Besides the power and USB-C connector, the only hole in the device is located on the back-left corner of the drive. I suspect it’s the Desk Drive’s only vent but I’m not sure since there’s no air blowing out to feel, again suggesting that there is no fan. After a sustained use of the Desk Drive for 1 hour, the drive never gets hot to a point where I can’t handle it. During operation the Desk Drive is at its hottest on the top of the device, but it’s still safe to touch. The Desk Drive is preformatted in exFAT so it’s compatible with Windows and macOS out of the box. On the drive itself is a single folder labeled “SanDisk Software” and it’s only 1.49 MB with 3 files: Software downloader for Mac (dmg), Windows (exe), and instructions for the software downloader (pdf). It doesn’t host the actual software itself. You will need an internet connection. You can always download the backup software, Acronis True Image, from Western Digital’s support website so you don’t need the included software downloader. Bear in mind that you’ll need almost 1 GB of free space to install Acronis. -=CrystalDiskMark 8.0.5 x64 test=- Sequential speed is the speed of a transfer of a single file. Random speed is the speed of a transfer when transferring many different files at once. Using the included USB-C cable plugged into Thunderbolt 4/USB 4 port: Sequential read: 1050.12 MB/s Sequential write: 1054.42 MB/s Random read: 126.93 MB/s Random write: 123.39 MB/s Using the cable with included USB-A adapter plugged into USB 3.2 Gen 2 port: Sequential read: 965.04 MB/s Sequential write: 900.53 MB/s Random read: 235.62 MB/s Random write: 215.50 MB/s Repeated tests will differ slightly but it lives up to its 1000 MB/s max read claim. I find it curious that the random speeds were slower on a USB 4 port but this may be a case of “your mileage may vary (YMMV)” and could just be my motherboard (ASUS ProArt X570-CREATOR WIFI). It’s not slow by any means, but just a glaring difference to me. It’s still dramatically faster than any mechanical drive solution out there. SSD is on a different class. -=Real life tests=- My PC’s NVMe SSD used in the following tests does 5000 MB/s read, 2200 MB/s write so it’s significantly faster than the Desk Drive and won’t be a bottleneck (a bottleneck is the thing that causes an output to be less than what you expect it to be). 34.4 GB of data comprised of 1095 files and 24 folders using USB-C cable: Desk Drive to NVMe SSD: 45 seconds NVMe SSD to Desk Drive: 57 seconds The same test using the USB-A adapter with the cable were pretty similar: SSD to NVMe SSD: 41 seconds NVMe SSD to SSD: 53 seconds 784 GB of data comprised of 64 files and 13 folders using USB-C cable: Desk Drive to NVMe SSD: 17 minutes NVMe SSD to Desk Drive: 21 minutes As you can see in all instances, the write speed takes slightly longer than the read speed. My read speeds typically range around the 930-960 MB/s My write speeds range around 575-700 MB/s Over a 10 minute span, the speeds were consistent, not showing any sign of thermal throttling. Acronis full backup of 706 GB from the NVMe SSD: 25 minutes Other external SSDs on the market at this price range with this storage capacity are only about half as fast as the Desk Drive (540 MB/s). The external SSDs that do run as fast as the Desk Drive typically don’t have a model with a storage capacity as high as the Desk Drive at 8TB. Spinning drives, while affordable, are nearly 5x slower than the Desk Drive. The SanDisk Desk Drive is currently the best bang for your dollar when it comes to high capacity AND high-speed storage. I highly recommend it.

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  Posted 1 year ago by KusMoG

• Rated 5 out of 5 stars

  VOLUMINOUS CAPACITY SSD – FAST READ SPEED!

  • Tech Insider Network Member
  • Top 25 Contributor

  A serious interest in photography and videography results in the need for very significant digital storage capacity for the many large files. Resultantly, maintaining full backups of all data requires a lot of storage real estate. The SanDisk Desk Drive has a large 8 TB capacity in a compact solid state drive unit with a claimed Read Speed of 1000 MB/s. The SanDisk Desk Drive is constructed of black ABS plastic, with an orange plastic band in the center where the top and bottom shells are joined. The drive measures approximately 3-7/8” x 3-7/8” x 1-5/8” tall. The sides are rounded bevels and the corners are radiused. It weighs 9.6 oz. (272 grams). The rear of the housing has a barrel connector for attaching the power connector from the included low-voltage power supply, as well as a USB-C connector. There is also a small, approximately 1/4" x 1/8” window in the rear, left radius of the bottom shell. I presume that this may be for ventilation. There is no drive activity lamp (LED) on the SanDisk Desk Drive. SanDisk includes a nice, thick jacketed 39” long USB-C to USB-C cable, and also includes a USB-C to USB-A adaptor if you choose to use that slow interface. The 12 Volt, 1.5 Amp power supply is equipped with a low voltage cord extending almost 6’ in length. The power supply is marked with a UL approval. The prongs on the power supply require horizontal orientation of the power block, which may be advantageous or disadvantageous depending on the orientation of the taps in the surge suppressor utilized. I wonder why the SanDisk Desk Drive requires an external 12 volt power supply when all of the portable SSDs that I own (up to 4 TB) are USB powered, which is of course more convenient. The only performance claim made by SanDisk is that of 1000 MB/s Read Speed. There is no claim for the Write Speed, which is typically slightly slower. Every other drive that I own has a specification for both. I benchmarked my SanDIsk Desk Drive using CrystalDiskMark 8, and included the test results in my review photographs. Using the included USB-C cable, connected to a Thunderbolt 4 port on my laptop, the SanDisk Desk Drive achieved 1077.14 MB/s on a sequential read test. It also had a very respectable sequential write speed. In fact, the Desk Drive benchmarked slightly better than my SanDisk Extreme Portable SSD, which claims slightly higher Read (and write) speeds. I also repeated the benchmarking using the supplied USB-C to USB-A adaptor in conjunction with the supplied USB cable, connected to a USB-A port of my laptop. Using that interface, the scores were, of course, dismal. The SanDisk Desk Drive ships with exFAT formatting, making it usable with both Windows and MAC OS. It can of course be reformatted to NTFS. On the root partition is a link to the Western Digital Support site, Software Downloads page. The site offers several utilities, including disk security, disk management and backup. Interestingly, none of the software available on that site indicate their compatibility with the DeskDrive. Evidently, the site has yet to be updated to reflect the new DeskDrive product. I chose to install the Western Digital Dashboard utility on my laptop. Using the “Dashboard” I was able to check for updated firmware. The Dashboard reported that the original firmware was up to date. The Dashboard also reports the internal temperature of the Desk Drive. The utility reported an operating temperature of 111° when the drive was idle. After performing a 14 minute transfer of some video files, the internal temperature peaked at 141°. The exterior of the Desk Drive’s enclosure was only slightly warm to the touch at all times. There is a paucity of information available about the SanDisk Desk Drive. I located a webpage dedicated to the Desk Drive. Unfortunately, the digital assets listed on that webpage, such as a PDF product Data Sheet are not available due to broken links. Both the Desk Drive dedicated support page and the WD Software Download page offer the download links for Acronis True Image for Western Digital backup utility software for a five year licensed subscription period. I have reservations about the Acronis software, and elected not to install it at this time. Users are restricted to a 90 day interval from the date of the Desk Drive purchase in which to download and install the Acronis True Image software. My trepidation regarding the Acronis software is based on initial online research, as well as information contained in the Acronis Knowledge Base regarding a potentially problematic removal process when uninstalling the software from a Windows system and endeavoring to get a clean and complete removal of the application and its artifacts, including Windows Registry entries. Therefore, I have deferred installing Acronis pending further investigation. The SanDisk Desk Drive carries a three year warranty, which is of course two years shorter than the five year warranty that my SanDisk portable SSDs are covered by. The side panel of the SanDisk Desk Drive package lists Compatibility with Windows10+, Windows 8.1” and Mac OS 11+. Addressing the “elephant in the room”, I am of course very familiar with the catastrophic failures of SOME SanDisk Extreme Portable SSD drives. In fact, I had a 1 TB SanDisk Extreme drive that was replaced under warranty. My drive could not be reflashed with the new firmware that SanDisk released to address some drive failures. My drive was no longer recognized by the OS at all. It was a paperweight. Fortunately, I did not lose irreplaceable data which was not stored elsewhere. I have read that some people no longer trust the SanDIsk or Western Digital brands as a result of that product failure. I am not among those abandoning this well established and long-trusted company. Western Digital has been one of my preferred sources for hard disk drives, and SanDisk has been among my favorites for flash memory products. In fact, all of my digital cameras, action cameras and drones currently have SanDisk SD or MicroSD cards in them and I just purchased several more. The reliability of any product is an unknown variable, and many, many companies have failures with one or more of their products. Western Digital and SanDisk have been trusted, reliable brands for a very long time. I continue to select SanDisk storage products and of course my hope is that my SanDisk Desk Drive will be as reliable as all of my other SanDisk and Western Digital storage have been, with the single exception discussed herein. I have always endeavored to maintain redundant backups of data, because any electronic device may potentially fail. I have performed a full backup and a few incremental backups using the SanDisk Desk Drive. I have also worked on some large graphic files and video files that I placed on the Desk Drive, to assess how working on live files with this drive’s read/write speeds would be, compared to working from the internal SSD. I have been very impressed. I acquired the SanDisk Desk Drive because it is a large, 8 TB capacity, solid-state drive capable of fast access/transfer speeds. The USB 3.2 Gen 2, 10 Gbps interface and 1000 MB/s read speed are real advantages. On benchmarking, the fast speeds are validated, and in use I am indeed finding the SanDisk Desk Drive to be a good, fast external drive. The only shortcoming from my perspective is the external power supply, rather than the drive being USB powered. A drive activity LED would also have been a nice touch. Overall, I am pleased with the SanDisk Desk Drive. It has the large capacity of a Hard Disk Drive, combined with the fast speeds of a Solid State Drive, which is a genuinely beneficial and attractive package.

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  Posted 1 year ago by Curmudgeon1