Once in a while, you come across a device that does it all – and does it well. When it comes to a mobile storage companion, Trek iSSD ticks the check boxes of all the functionalities that I’ve always wanted in a single device.
Three of biggest problems holding back a mobile worker on the move are: storage space, battery power and the ability to share.
With the limited storage space on notebooks, tablets and mobile phones, workers on the move quickly run out of storage space on their mobile devices, especially if their work require huge media files that they have to present at meetings and discuss with their clients.
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The Trek iSSD measures 120 x 75 x 15mm and weighs 230g. It has an aluminum alloy frame with glass cover.
At home, the easy solution is to buy a desktop hard disk drive (HDD) with a huge capacity eg. 6-12TB – but it is not something you can bring on the road.
Next up is the portable HDD which is more expensive but provides the expanded storage space needed on the move.
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My Trek iSSD portable, wireless SSD is the black one with 240GB capacity. Two other capacities are the blue 480GB and red 960GB iSSD.
What if you want to share those huge files with fellow workers or clients so they can peruse them on their own computers?
You can plug in the portable HDD (eg. 2-4TB) to their computers so they can download/upload files directly with the drive – but it’s a hassle to plug in and out if you’re in a team of workers sharing that same portable HDD.
Wireless Connectivity
It uses 2.4GHz IEEE802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi at 300Mbps.
A 5MB song took one second to download while a 30MB RAW file took only five seconds.
Security-wise, the iSSD employs WEP 64/128, WPA, WPA2.
So I was delighted with the Trek iSSD drive which not only provides portable expanded storage space – both wirelessly or via a USB cable (USB3.1 Type-C up to 10Gbps) – but doubles up as a wireless file server as well enabling a team of up to eight to access the files in the Trek iSSD at the same time.
Both wireless upload and download speeds are fast and everybody in the team can download/upload/stream files simultaneously from their laptops, tablets or phones.
This is useful as well at home, where different members of the family can wirelessly share the Trek iSSD simultaneously – either while #WorkingFromHome, doing #HomeBasedLearning or simply chilling out and streaming music or video from the iSSD.
Who is Trek?
Trek 2000 International Ltd is the inventor of the ubiquitous ThumbDrive in 2000 – the USB Flash Drive that everybody uses nowadays – the replacement of the floppy disk drive.
The homegrown company is listed on the Singapore Stock Exchange and has offices around the world
This is even more useful on family vacations, I haven’t travelled lately as a family due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but I can just envisage dumping ALL the music, video (and work files – hopefully not) into the iSSD so that family members can wirelessly access them in the hotel room, on the road and wherever we may be during the trip.
What’s more, if you’re taking lots of photos, you can easily backup those SD cards onto the iSSD by inserting the card into the SD card slot at the side of the iSSD and pressing the power button twice.
The iSSD will backup your photos from the SD card to itself.
Prices and Where to Buy
The Trek iSSD comes in three capacities.
- 240GB (black):
USD$179 (S$245) - 480GB (blue):
USD$239 (S$349) - 960GB (red):
USD$339 (S$499)
Available online at www.thumbdrive.com or Canon EShop.
Trek calls this “One Touch Backup” – technically it should be “Two Touch Backup” since you gotta press the power button twice. Okay that’s just being pedantic.
You can do the same with a microSD card using the microSD card adaptor that comes in the box with the Trek iSSD.
You can also transfer files from thumb drives and other desktop storage devices to and from the iSSD via the USB-A port on the iSSD.
For photographers, you can even set up your camera (if it has wireless transmission features) and the iSSD so that when you take a photo, a copy is automatically sent to the iSSD.
I know photographers that’ll love this feature.
My Take
The Trek iSSD is a versatile storage companion to provide extra storage space that can be shared wirelessly with up to eight computers, tablets and smartphones.
It doubles up as a battery bank that provides both wired and wireless charging, and triples up as a wireless file server to upload photos from cameras and stream music/video to mobile devices.
A must-have do-it-all storage device for the mobile team worker.
A friend of mine provides event photography and he had a team of photographers covering events snapping photos that are uploaded wirelessly and simultaneously in real-time to the shared iSSD so he could provide a real-time slideshow on stage to event guests.
That’s thanks to the file server in the iSSD.
The technical specification says the iSSD can serve up to eight users wirelessly, but you can go beyond that, although the speed takes a hit depending on how much you overload the network.
As a portable storage device cum file server, I find eight devices to be plenty enough – either for a team of photographers, a huddle team or a family.
To top it all off, if you’re on the road and your devices start running low on battery, the iSSD serves as a power bank as well!
A pleasant journey of discovery of what the Trek iSSD can do
I started out looking for a simple portable Solid-State Drive (SSD) to replace my traditional portable Hard Disk Drive (HDD), looking for a more robust, portable, faster storage device.
The Trek iSSD not only provides wireless access, it enables wireless sharing as well for team working and family sharing.
It even serves as a wireless power bank for my (and other team members’) mobile devices!
Is it compatible with both Apple and Windows computers and well as Android and iOS devices? Yes.
Can it serve as a digital companion to backup files from USB drives and SD/microSD cards? Yes, it even offers one-touch back up of the SD cards.
Can it upload photos from cameras in real-time, or stream music and videos to mobile devices? Yes.
The 3000mAh battery in the iSSD can charge your mobile devices either through the USB-A port (5V, 2A, 10W) or wirelessly as well (via Qi wireless charging).
The iSSD itself can be charged via its USB-C port or wirelessly as well.
Wireless charging for the iSSD is at 5V, 1A, 5W for both input and output.
The Trek iSSD is compatible with Mac and Windows computers, as well as iOS and Android tablets and smartphones.
The minimum operating system version you’ll need for compatibility are:
- Windows 7/8/10
- Mac OS v10.11
- Android 4.4
- iOS 8
For wireless access to the Trek iSSD, simply download the companion app which provides intuitive file management control to copy, delete or transfer files to and from iSSD.
Playback of media files and documents include the major formats: DOCX, PPTX, XLSX, TXT, JPG, PNG, MP3, AVI, WMV, FLV, MKV, RMVB etc.
Tags: iSSD, mobility, productivity, SSD, storage, tech4xmas, tech4xmas2020, Trek, wireless
If my phone is connected to the issd via Wi-Fi, can i still access the Internet via home Wi-Fi?
Yes you can. You can set the iSSD to Internet relay mode. So that the iSSD is connected to the Internet via your broadband router’s Wi-Fi network, and then the devices that are connected to the iSSD connect to the Internet via the iSSD.
Cool! so I can be connected to the ssd and still have access to the Internet via Wi-Fi. Great! thanks
you’re welcome Akshay!