The SanDisk Extreme Portable SSD is a popular external SSD that we wanted in our series. This is SanDisk’s mid-range SSD With a USB-C, USB 3.2 Gen 2. We bought the 2TB capacity to test.
At around $149, the SanDisk Extreme Portable SSD 2TB is usually about $10 less than the T7 Shield and the same price as the Samsung T7. It is $10 more than the Crucial X9 Pro. We have been using many T7 Shields at STH, and want to put all of these to the test to see which performs best.
If you just want to get a SanDisk Extreme Portable SSD 2TB, here is the Amazon Affiliate Link.
The SanDisk Extreme Portable SSD – 2TB Hardware Overview
The drive itself is one of the larger ones at around 53 x 100 x 10 mm. This is notably larger than some of the other drives we have tested and feels like a giant compared to the Crucial X9 Pro.
This SSD comes in three different colors. That is useful when you have a few of them and want them to be easy to identify. Also, if you do not care about the color, then sometimes you can score a deal where one color costs significantly less than others. We have seen 20% deltas in street pricing on a given day based on color.
On the first side, we have the USB-C, USB 3.2 Gen 2 port.
The label shows clear the storage capacity on the bottom.
We also get up to three-meter drop protection and IP65 water and dust resistance. While the physical durability has been good, we should note that years ago SanDisk had challenges with data retention on drives. New drive versions and firmware have been introduced to address those challenges, and we did not have issues with this one.
In the box we get a USB-C to USB-C cable and a USB-C to USB-A adapter. That may not seem like a big deal, but some competitive drives do not come with the Type-A connectivity. We have used a few as charging cables as well.
This is only a 10Gbps class SSD, so it is not the fastest, but let us take a look at the performance next.
What are people using these for? More storage for sentry mode?
Not to be confused with the new Extreme PRO which uses a USB4 Gen 3×2 interface and costs about $100 more at the same size.
Also buyer beware, because SanDisk uses such similar shells for their Extreme and Extreme Pro USB SSD products, sometimes you can’t tell the difference between them. (the part # only varies by 1 digit).
Just noticed for those interested, these are on sale today (Jul 10) for $120 for the black and the blue versions.
Are these fixed versions of those that were the source of the lawsuit against Western Digital (https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/08/sandisk-extreme-ssds-are-worthless-multiple-lawsuits-against-wd-say/)?