INTRODUCTION

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

   I've always believed that having an excessive amount of free HDD space available around is always a lot better than to need it and not have it so whenever someone comes up to me and tells me that he/she plans on purchasing a new model to replace the old and smaller one i always say to also keep the old one either as a secondary drive or as an external backup drive even if they think there's no point in doing that. That being said when it comes to portable needs most people will never even fully utilize a 500GB portable hard drive but there are quite a few people that will do so and to them a 1TB PHD is really a one way. Capacity however is not the only important thing when we're talking about portable hard drives, the enclosure also pays a significant role since it's responsible for the health of the drive inside so it's always preferable to choose one of the rugged models that offer superior protection. The Armor A30 by Silicon Power is the latest addition in their Armor line of PHDs and today we will be taking a thorough look at it.

 

   Silicon Power Computer & Communications Inc., founded in 2003 by a group of enthusiastic specialists in International Business, Global Marketing, and Technical Engineering of flash data storage industry. Well dedicated in brand image and product quality, Silicon Power has been recognized and well accepted by millions of end-users in more than 100 countries, becomes the world's leading manufacturer of flash memory cards, USB flash drives, card readers, DRAM modules, solid state disks, and portable hard drives in less than a decade. Headquartered in Taipei, we continuously established various branches throughout the world including Netherlands, Japan, Russia, Mainland China and other emerging market to reach the worldwide market. Silicon Power's overall performance has gradually drawn great attention worldwide. In 2006, we received Taiwan Rising Star Award for our foreign business achievement. In 2008, we won 17th National Outstanding Small & Medium Enterprise Award for our outstanding progress. Moreover, with superior quality and innovative design, our products stood out in several competitions and awarded Taiwan Excellence and COMPUTEX Design & Innovation Award in 2009, 2010 and 2011. Winning trust of global consumers, Silicon Power holds a record of successive double-digit revenue growth for last seven years. According to the Common Wealth Magazine's 2010 Survey of Taiwan Top 1000 Manufacturers, our 2009 revenue growth rate was ranked No.11 among Taiwan's top 1000 manufacturers, and even ranked No.1 in semiconductor industry. Positioned as Passionate, Creative and Hungry for Success, Silicon Power introduces products for users who are seeking individualized, unique and personal digital storage devices. With the mission of creating unprecedented experience for users, Silicon Power will endeavor to deliver a full range of high quality products that have innovative designs, distinctly unique features and comprehensive after sales services to create and fulfill your personal memory.

 

   As revealed by the number in the name of the product the plastic housing of the Armor A30 is the 2nd most powerful one in the Armor line and so although unlike the majority of the drives in the market it can withstand drops from up to 122cm based on the USA military standard (MIL-STD 810G) it's really no match for its larger brother the aluminum Armor A80. This time over under the hood of the Armor A30 Silicon Power has placed the Seagate ST1000LM024 an 2.5" 1TB SATA II HDD that features a rotational speed of 5400RPM along with 16MB Cache. That which really separates the Armor A30 from the rest of the Armor line however is the somewhat strange way Silicon Power designed the enclosure so the USB 3.0 cable can be attached to the enclosure externally when not used (check the above image). This is not something that I’m particularly fond of about the Armor A30 but the rugged housing more than just makes up for that. As for its performance well that's something that we just need to wait and see.

 

 

SPECIFICATIONS AND FEATURES

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PACKAGING AND CONTENTS

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Silicon Power has been using the same box for their PHDs for a long time now so once again you can take a look at the drive from the clear plastic opening at the front while right next to that you can see the main unit features and its capacity.

 

 

Some examples on how many files you can store in 500GB/1TB are present on the left side.

 

 

The features of the Armor A30 are printed at the rear in 14 languages right above the specifications table, the bundle contents and the OS compatibility list.

 

 

Unfortunately the bundle is very limited so aside the A30 and the USB 3.0 cable you are also getting a user’s manual.

 

 

THE ARMOR A30

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Armor A30 features a nice plastic housing and comes in 2 color variations black/orange and white/grey.

 

 

Size-wise the A30 is slightly smaller than its larger brother but unlike the A80 it has a cool design (personally i think i like the A80 more but others disagree).

 

 

The company logo along with the line name is printed at the top of the enclosure.

 

 

At the rear you can see the model capacity, country of manufacture and several warning/certification logos.

 

 

Like i said the way the USB 3.0 cable gets stored around the enclosure is weird but it does work.

 

 

Much like the Armor A80 the A30 model also has a regular size USB 3.0 host port.

 

 

The ST1000LM024 2.5" HDD model by Seagate/Samsung rotates at 5400RPM, has a total of 16MB Cache and follows the SATA II protocol.

 

 

TEST BED

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TESTING METHODOLOGY 

 

   Keeping things simple so even people new in the field of computers can understand will always be our way so once again our testing procedure is almost exactly the same as the one we use with 2.5/3.5" external docking stations. This time however we will be comparing the product at hand with a wide range of 2.5" portable drives and standalone 2.5" enclosures all of which were benched using a HGST 7K750 SATA II hard disk drive. Our standard selection of benchmark suites is used here as well including the famous HD Tach RW (Long Bench 32mb Zones), HD Tune Pro (read/write -when possible- speeds), Sisoftware Sandra Pro (Read/Write - also when possible- speeds), AIDA64 (Linear Read/Random Read), Crystal Disk Mark x64 (100MB/1000MB read/write speeds) and finally the quite outdated yet highly reliable ATTO 2.47 (Max Read/Max Write speeds). Every test was repeated for a total of 6 times and after that the average (not peak) numbers were recorded into our charts. As always every test was performed in a fresh installation of Microsoft Windows 7 Service Pack 1 with every update installed up to October 13th 2013.

 

 

TEST RESULTS - AIDA64 / ATTO

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TEST RESULTS - HD TACH RW / HD TUNE PRO

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TEST RESULTS - SISOFTWARE SANDRA PRO / CRYSTAL DISK MARK X64

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TEST RESULTS - TEMPERATURES

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CONCLUSION

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   Although Silicon Power has used the same drive model for all 3 Armor PHDs we've tested so far namely the Seagate/Samsung ST1000LM024 (only this time over it seems to have an updated Cache of 16MB) we got some strange results since sometimes the A30 managed to beat both the A15 and the A80 and sometimes the exact opposite. Now i can't say if this is because of the USB 3.0 controller used this time (perhaps it's a different model) or because the drive seems to be slightly upgraded (and thus some performance difference may exist) but it did surprise us regardless. That being said overall the Armor A30 performed on par with the rest of the Armor line models with very good read/write speeds so we can't really complain. If you get down to it there's really nothing wrong with the Armor A30, the design is good, it can withstand drops of up to 122cm, it's very fast, it's available in two color combinations (black/orange - white/grey) and it's even slightly smaller than its Armor line brothers. I have to admit that the USB 3.0 cable mounting is something that some people may not really like at first (much like myself) but it does work so we can't really complain about that either.

 

   As we speak the Armor A30 1TB USB 3.0 Portable Hard Drive retails for a very tempting price tag of USD79.98 inside the USA (Amazon.com) and 88Euros inside the EU (Amazon.co.uk). However at the same time the current pricing of the Armor A30 comes extremely close to the pricing of its larger brother the Armor A80 and although the A80 has been around for a while and that would explain its price reduction at least for me it's the better choice because of its buffed rugged aluminum enclosure. So unless Silicon Power does something with the pricing of the Armor A30 i really don't see a reason as to why anyone would choose it over the Armor A80 (unless it's a design thing). If you are after the best possible protection for your data paired with very good performance you really can't go wrong with any of the Armor models by Silicon Power including the latest A30 which is why it also gets our Golden Award.

PROS

- Build Quality
- Design
- Size
- Military Grade Rugged Enclosure (Shock/Drop-proof)
- Very Good Performance
- Low Temperatures
- SP Widget (Free Download From Silicon Power)

 

 

CONS

- Design May Not Appeal To Everyone
- Price (Compared To That of the A80)