Portable SSDs & External Hard Drives in Canada

Portable SSDs, like the Samsung T7 and T9, SanDisk Extreme and Lexar SL300, are smaller, handle drops better and are many times faster, at roughly 1,000–2,000 MB/s compared with a portable hard drive’s typical 100–150 MB/s. External hard drives such as the Seagate One Touch and WD My Passport hold more for the money and suit backups.

USB 3.2 Gen 2 runs at 10Gbps, about 1,050 MB/s on drives like the SanDisk Extreme and Lexar SL300. Gen 2x2 runs at 20Gbps, up to 2,000 MB/s on the SanDisk Extreme PRO and Samsung T9, but only on a Gen 2x2 port; on other ports it runs at the port’s speed.

Most ship formatted as exFAT, which Windows and macOS both read and write. Consoles reformat a drive when you set it up as extended storage.