Iomega eGo

External hard drives are not all about storage and performance, they also add to your personality if you do carry one along with you everywhere. Iomega reiterated the fact with their Iomega eGo Portable hard drive that not only promises to deliver strong performance but also act as a fasion accessory!

Iomega eGo Portable Hard Drive specifications :

• Dimensions : 3.5″ x 5.2″ x 0.7″
• Exterior color : Red, Silver
• Capacity : 160GB
• External data transfer rate : 480 Mbps
• Drive speed : 5400rpm
• Cache : 8MB
• OS Compatibility : Mac OS X, Windows 2000 or later
• Warranty : 1 year
• Approx. price : $110

The drive is extremely thin at just 0.7″ and the red color gives it a flashy look, although there is also a more subdued silver color. The build quality of the drive is impressive and feels solid and sturdy. The drive is made of anodized aluminum and polished steel which is mainly responsible for its looks. The drive is priced extremely competitively priced at just $110.

The hard drive is powered by a USB-port itself instead of those bulky adapters. Iomega has surprisingly placed the activity LED at the rear of the drive, which is quite inexplicable. The drive is light weight also making for a great companion. The drive has DropGuard feature which protects the drive from shocks when not in use as the drive has extra padding inside the case to protect it from shocks.

The drive comes preformatted with FAT32 partition which can be read by both Mac and Windows and for that matter even Linux. If you intend to use it with OS X primarily then format it with Disk Utility to HFS file format. The drive bundles the EMC’s Restrospect Express 6.1 software to carry out the various tasks. The updated version compatible with OS X Leopard is available on their site. The software can be used to make partial/full backups, duplicate images, create bootable recovery CD but sadly can’t do encryption of data.

The drive has impressive performance. Writing assorted data to drive yielded an average write speed of 20MBps, one of the best in its category. The read speed from the drive is even better at 22Mbps. Surely, the Iomega eGO Portable Hard Drive manages to pull in good read/write speeds along with great looks!

Pros :

• Slim and small dimensions
• Attractive look
• USB Powered
• Good performance
• Backup software included

Cons :

• Backup software not Mac compatible
• No encryption of data utility

Final Thoughts

The Iomega eGO Portable Hard Drive is an excellent drive from Iomega and manages to put everything in place perfectly. The only flaws that you van find are with the bundled software. So, there is no doubt that if you are looking for a portable drive, grab this one.

My Rating : 4.25/5