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The best external SSD we’ve tested

$399.95 From G–Technology, g-technology.com Needs Thunderbolt 3 port

Superfast SSDs are all the rage at the minute, thanks to Thunderbolt 3’s big 40Gbps bandwidth. That enables external drives to promise performance like never before — in this case, up to 2,800MB/sec.

However, as ever with marketing of storage devices, you have to bear in mind that figure is only the best possible case scenario. In our tests, the drive came up a little short of that, peaking at 2,710MB/sec when reading data. Minimum rates in BlackMagic Disk Speed Test, which repeatedly performs large single–file transfers, were 1,043MB/sec when reading and 2,203MB/sec when writing. Yes, those are the minimum; mean averages were 1,286 and 2,234MB/sec, respectively. As for managing heat, BlackMagic’s test showed occasional spikes in reading to around 1,700MB/sec.

The G–Drive is large — more like a slim 2.5in hard drive. On top is a vent, under which you can see an aluminum heat sink. Speeds certainly speak to that setup doing a better job than, say, the sealed surface of Samsung’s SSD X5.

the bottom line. With its great speeds, the mobile Pro SSD is a great for tasks like high–end video editing.