Professional photographers and videographers tend to favor using fast external SSDs for working on shoots. Small and light, they are a much more cost–effective way of adding storage to your Mac than paying Apple’s premium for a larger internal drive when you first buy your computer. SanDisk takes this concept a step further with the Pro–Blade system, a rugged caddy paired with removable SSD magazines. The idea is that you can swap magazines in and out as you work without needing to carry multiple regular–sized drives.
The caddy itself is relatively inexpensive and comes with a heavy–duty USB–C cable that’s certified for up to 20Gbps. Different cables may look similar but can have very different capabilities, so it’s advisable not to just use one you have lying around. The caddy is small but extremely well built, with SanDisk claiming three–meter drop resistance as well as 4,000lb crush resistance. It’s probably not in too much danger being tossed into your kit bag.
The mags, which come in 1, 2 or 4TB capacities, are very light and compact and slide into the caddy with a very reassuring fit. There’s no catch system but you feel it dock properly, and removing the mag is equally smooth. Our brand–new review model arrived formatted for Mac though you can of course re–format using Disk Utility should you wish. The drive is certified for read and write speeds of up to 2,000MB/sec or 20Gbps, though in tests on a 2020 Intel MacBook Pro it topped out at around 950MB/sec. It turns out this is actually the Mac’s fault, with virtually every Intel and M–powered Mac actually offering only around 10Gbps over their USB–C ports.
This is unfortunate but does seem to be a known issue, and for the vast majority of users the speeds you can achieve by pairing a Mac with the Pro–Blade will be more than acceptable. A 250GB folder of multiple items copied from the Mac in around four and a half minutes and running the Blackmagic Disk Speed Test showed the performance as sufficient for working with up to 8K video files, in excess of the 4K that is much more common. Even certain formats of 12K video would work at these speeds. The caddy has an integrated heat sink though it barely got warm under load in our tests.
The fact that the mags can be swapped means you have more flexibility in buying the capacities you need as you need them, perhaps scaling up when bigger jobs come around. In a studio or on–set situation you might find yourself swapping mags between a caddy attached to a laptop and one attached to a desktop machine, ferrying footage or sessions back and forth without constantly unplugging USB–C cables. As a system it’s possibly slight overkill for home users but for professionals needing high–capacity, fast, swappable storage it’s a very effective solution.
Features: USB–C, swappable SSD magazines, rugged caddy
Needs: macOS 10.13 or later, Windows 10 or later
PRO-BLADE TRANSPORT Price: $59.99 (Caddy only); $179.99 (1TB mag); $299.99 (2TB mag); $499.99 (4TB mag)
PRO-BLADE SSD Mag Price: $129.99 (1TB); $249.99 (2TB); $449.99 (4TB)
Fast and flexible SSD storage for professionals.
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