Samsung T5 1 TB USB 3.1 Gen 2 (10 Gbps, Type-C) External Solid State Drive (Portable SSD) Metallic Red (MU-PA1T0R)

This has been my experience: at the beginning it was all good and it performed well. But within a couple of weeks it started to malfunction. It became unavailable for the input of the password. I contacted customer support and after many emails coming and going, the problem was sorted. I thought, that's it. But it wasn't. It malfunctioned again, and I decided to send the device back as I could see it would keep happening. I would have been happy with a replacement, as I know these things happen, but then – and this is the catch – I found out that I had no control over the disk and its contents, and could not delete those contents. I was told by Samsung customer service that I needed a particular key, which they would give me upon the presentation of proof of purchase, and a signed 3 page document of Terms and Conditions regarding a factory reset. the procedure was that I had to download a factory reset programme which gave me a key, passed that on to Samsung's customer support who then gave me a key that allowed the deletion of the contents. Even there I encountered the problem of the device making itself unavailable, I had to restart the computer to get it to work. In the end I was successful and am now returning the disk to Amazon, determined to keep well away from Samsung's products. The time and energy I have spent on all of this, plus the fact that I could not reset the device myself, was totally unacceptable.

This tiny little external SSD drive has transformed my iMac 2017 into a blazing fast computer. For some reason this iMac has been really slow to do any task, but using this as a boot-up drive has been a very cheap and simple solution. How to install:** Note my settings if you are on the latest MacOs Catalina:1) Go to the Samsung firmware page and download the latest software2) Applications > Utilities > Disk Utility > 'view all devices'3) Click on the external drive icon > Erase4) Select APFS (Not Mac OS Journaled as it used to be)Scheme: GUID Partition map5) Download Mac OS Catalina onto this drive6) Once done > System Preferences > Startup Disk > select your SSD driveYour Mac will now boot up on this drive. You can then use your main HD for your files, and keep Applications on your SSD drive. Hope that works for you too!

I purchased a SanDisk Extreme Portable to gift photos to a life long friend of mine. The SanDisk turned out NOT to have hardware encryption, only software.Having learnt my lesson a while ago after 'losing' an unencrypted USB key with personal financial information on holiday (which turned out wasn't lost but had been left plugged into my computer back at home) I now refuse to use any portable unencrypted media.Losing 500G of personal files was not an option! The SanDisk with software encryption was returned and this Samsung with hardware encryption was purchased.First of all, the Samsung SSD is beautifully made. I purchased the rose gold version which I know my friend would like as it looks fashionable, sleek and modern. The SSD looks as if it can easily be scratched so I recommend a protective case. I purchased the "XANAD Protective Case for Samsung T3 / T5" in which the drives slots perfectly. The case also holds the USB cables which is handy.The drive's performance is lighting fast over USB 3.0, no issues to report here.However, when you receive the drive, make sure you UPGRADE the firmware first! In researching secure drives, I read the original firmware on the device which I received in October 2019 had a major security flaw which Samsung subsequently patched. Samsung probably now ship the SSDs with the latest firmware, but don't risk it and update!Prior to updating my firmware, I thought I should test whether the update wipes the drive. So I encrypted the drive, transferred some files, and performed an upgrade. When re-mounting the drive, all my files were still there. Of course, always have a backup prior to performing any updates (in case you do need to wipe the drive should something stop working).All in all, highly recommend this SSD thanks to its inbuilt hardware encryption. I am impatiently waiting for Samsung to produce an 8TB version in the coming years so that I can back up my entire photo library of RAW files (encrypted of course)!

More for information:Arrived formatted to ex-FAT.Copying from an identical device: 479GB in c 1 hr 10 mins. All (audio) library files and their management software for use in a Digital Audio Workstation. Processor speed 2.4GI watched the progress. The write rate hovered around 100MB/s almost constantly.I've had the original drive (also a T5 1TB) working day in day out for 7 months without trouble and hope this performs just as well. It may seem an extravagance using a second SSD as a backup. The files are also backed up on a mechanical hard drive in case of worse disaster - if the SSD goes down I'd have to get a new one to recover. Best just to have it there to plug in if needed. I tend to be obsessive about backing up having encountered disaster before.These drives are very light and portable. The different colours might seem like decoration but they do allow them to be distinguished easily.

At first this was very useful and worked very well. Super fast transfer speeds between my MacBook using the USB C cable. Very small and portable, super small and light. HiHowever after a while it started asking for a password to access my files which I didn’t set up. It wouldn’t allow me to access the drive, I had to format the drive and it worked again, the after a while it started asking for a password again.I gave up and returned it back for a refund.