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Of
The New, Tiny, Featherweight FireWire Drives, Which
Is The Smallest? Fastest? Best Value? -- "FireFly"?
"FireLite"? "Cutie"? "Clear 911"? January
11th, 2002 The
SmartDisk "FireFly"
uses the same 1.8 inch drive as the iPod (which
I believe is Toshiba's model MK5002MAL).
At 91 grams, The FireFly weighs half as much as
the iPod (or "Cutie!). It's the smallest and
lightest of all. It's even lighter than the
popular Nokia 8260 cell phone. It is truly "palm
sized." The
FWDepot "Cutie!"
is the world's smallest 2.5 inch FireWire
enclosure. It will take any 9.5 mm thick 2.5
inch hard drive including the new
40GB
"pixie dust" IBM 40GN
Travelstar.
I fitted it with the 30GB Travelstar 30GN
(identical to what ships on the TiBook 667).
With that drive the whole unit weighs in at 6.75
ounces (189 grams)--more than twice the weight
of the FireFly but still lighter than any 2.5
inch drive/enclosure tested to date included the
FireFly's bigger brother, the
"FireLite." The
SmartDisk "FireLite"
is slightly larger and heavier than the "Cutie"
but looks just like its smaller sibling, the
"FireFly." My test unit features the
Toshiba
40GB MK4018GAP
drive.
I noted from the specs that it uses the least
amount of power to spin up compared to the IBM
2.5 inch drives. For
perspective, I also tested the popular "Ultra
Compact" Portable FireWire (I call
"Clear
911")
enclosure from Trans International with the 48GB
5400rpm IBM Travelstar (and the 60GB 5400rpm
Travelstar). These drives are 12.5 mm thick so
they won't fit in the "Cutie!" case. This
beautiful clear case once looked so small. Now
it dwarfs the FireFly and Cutie. I've prepared
the table below to help clarify the size and
weight of each case (including in relation to
the iPod). Weight
with test drive Thickness Length Width Storage
Capacity as tested Maximum
Optional Drive Price
as tested *
NOTE: I'm learning to weigh and measure things
myself. I earlier reported that the "Cutie" was
thinner than the "FireFly" at 12.8 mm but when I
measured it myself, it was 16 mm thick. Thin,
but not as thin as the manufacturer lists in
their spec sheet. Oddly enough, the "Cutie" was
narrower and shorter than listed in the spec
sheet. **
3/12/02 -- SmartDisk dropped the price on
their tiny 5GB FireFly FireWire drive to
$199. FASTEST? The
"FireLite"
40G was surprisingly the fastest in three out of
four tests, even though the 60G and 48G drives
had a higher rotation speeds. Looking at the
drive specs, it should be no faster than the
30GB Cutie. Maybe their software or bridge board
has some optimizations the others lack. I also
noticed the The
5GB "FireFly"
was the slowest by far, to nobody's
surprise. BEST
VALUE? It
you look at speed versus cost
versus capacity versus size, the
"Cutie!"
comes out on top. You'll pay $137 for the 30GB
30GN Travelstar (GoogleGear.com)
and $125 for the "Cutie!" case (FWDepot.com)
for a total of $262. (... or $277 total if you
get the Cutie Combo case with FireWire and USB
2.0 ports). Put a 40GB Travelstar in it and the
price rises to $326. Compare
that to the "FireFly"
which costs $299 ( direct from SmartDisk.com),
only holds 5GB, and is much slower.
(NOTE:
since this article was posted, the priced
dropped to $199.
Buy.com
has it for $185.) Or
compare the Cutie to the 40GB FireLite
from SmartDisk at $399. Not as cheap as the
Cutie with the same size drive but you are
paying for a fancier case and faster
performance. Or...
compare that to the TransIntl "Clear
911"
case* with the 48GB Travelstar (GoogleGear.com)
for a total of $462 or with the 60GB Travelstar
(GoogleGear)
for a total of $554. Both are much faster than
the "Cutie!" but both are the biggest/heaviest
of the three case/drives. (*The Clear 911 case
is also available from FWDepot.com
(eDrive 911) and Other
World
Computing.) If
you are "rolling your own" FireWire drive, you
might be aware of IBM's new, exciting 2.5 inch
portable drives: FLASH:
02/12/02 -- Toshiba
announced
the industry's first 9.5mm 5400rpm
2.5 inch drive with up to 40GB
capacity...
and 16MB buffer....(and that isn't a
misprint). 4/20/02
-- WiebeTech
is shipping its novel "key chain" FireWire
drive. It accepts either Compact Flash or
Microdrive modules. I tested one with a 1GB
MicroDrive. It clocked 3.7MB/sec READ and
2.7MB/sec WRITE. That's 3 to 4 times faster than
the USB key chain drives you see advertised.
Price? $99 and you provide the memory
module. FIRE
IN YOUR CLOTHING Which
should you buy? It depends on your priorities.
If
you want a drive that fits in your shirt pocket
and doesn't make it sag, the "FireFly"
is the way to go. If
you want a faster, bigger capacity, good looking
drive, the "FireLite"
should please you. It fits your shirt pocket but
will make it sag to one side. If
you want the largest capacity (and fast)
portable FireWire drive, the "Clear
911"
with the 60GB Travelstar should meet your need.
It won't fit in your shirt pocket but it will
fit in your hip pocket. Just remember to take it
out when you sit down. If
you want an external drive that goes 35+ MB/sec
-- much faster than any of the portable FireWire
or internal laptop drives, you should consider a
not-so-portable, A/C powered, 3.5 inch FireWire
drive/case kit like the Cobra
or Granite. If
you want a portable, bus powered FireWire drive
that balances size, performance, and price, the
"Cutie!"
can't be beat. WHY
DO I NEED A SMALL, PORTABLE FIREWIRE
DRIVE? I
can think of all kinds of reasons. I like the
fact that you can carry them with you anywhere
and plug them into a desktop or laptop to do
your thing even without an A/C adapter. When I
go to MacWorld or even to the local CompUSA, I
carry one in my pocket along with a small
FireWire cable. If I see an interesting Mac I
want to test, I whip it out, plug it in, and
rock'n'roll. It carries all my test applications
and documents with room to spare. I
also use one for quickie dynamic backup of key
documents and/or for moving documents from one
system to another when networking is not
available or convenient. I always carry one with
me when traveling as a backup drive. Even if
your laptop has a CD burner, the portable
FireWire drive is faster, easier, and holds more
when it comes to backups. If
you are a system administrator, these compact,
portable FireWire drive/cases are a great tool
for carrying around the latest updates for
various Macs in the office. You can even boot
from the drive to run diagnostics. Until
I got an iPod, I used a portable FireWire drive
to carry around my favorite music. Even if you
put a 20GB in the "Cutie!"
case, you can hold 4 times as many MP3 tunes as
the iPod (or "FireFly")...
at half the cost. TEST
NOTES The
test "mule" was an Apple
Titanium G4 PowerBook (667MHz) with disk cache
set to 512K (to diminish effect of system
caching), AppleTalk OFF, Virtual Memory OFF, and
Extensions set to minimal (BASE). TEST
DRIVES: TEST
DRIVERS/FORMATTERS: Intech
HD Speed Tools is also a very good
formatter/driver for FireWire -- has a
"tuning" function to help you optimize
performance for your system. WHERE TO ORDER YOUR APPLE PRODUCTS © 1995-2007 Rob Art Morgan BARE FEATS
HOME
Updated January 15th with pictures of the FireFly,
Cutie and Clear 911 side by side
Updated January 17th with 60GH Travelstar in Clear
911 case
Updated January 23rd with 60GH Travelstar inside
Titanium G4 PowerBook
Updated February 11th with the NEW FireLite 40GB
(40GN) drive from SmartDisk
Updated March 12th with big
price drop
on the tiny FireFly
by rob
ART morgan,
Bare Feats Mad Scientist
SMALLEST?
FireFly
FireLite
Cutie
Clear 911
(183 grams)
(91 grams)
(192 grams)
(189 grams)
(312 grams)
(20 mm)
(13 mm)
(18 mm)
(16 mm)
(27 mm)
(102 mm)
(102 mm)
(130 mm)
(127 mm)
(140 mm)
(62 mm)
(62 mm)
(80 mm)
(75 mm)
(89 mm)
and
60 GB
or $524
The
TravelStar 40GN
4200rpm ( fits the Cutie case and Clear 911
case; available at GoogleGear.com
for $201)
The
TravelStar 60GH
5400rpm (fits the Clear 911 case only; The best
deal now is the GoogleGear.com
price of $429 )It
weighs 2.5 oz (75 grams) with microdrive and
measures 2.38 by 1.75 by .75 inches. (Compare
that to the spec chart above.) That makes the
WiebeTech
Key Chain world's smallest, lightest FireWire
drive enclosure--the ultimate stealth drive.
(*The Clear 911 case is also available from
FWDepot.com
(eDrive 911) and Other
World
Computing.)SmartDisk
has their own Formatter and Extensions for
the FireFly and FireLite. For the rest of the
drives, I used FWB
HD Toolkit 4.5.2.
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