INTRODUCTION

   Portable hard drives (2.5") may never have been as compact as USB flash drives but thanks to their considerably larger data capacities they've always been an invaluable asset for both professionals and consumers alike. Needless to say, portable solid state drives have changed the "landscape" of things lately but performance (and size) differences aside portable hard drives still enjoy the best price/capacity ratio currently in the market. That being said even though 5TB is the highest capacity one can opt for today 2TB models far exceed them in terms of popularity (especially among consumers) and so today I’ll be testing the latest model by Toshiba and more specifically their Canvio Advance USB 3.2 Gen 1 Portable Storage.

   Toshiba Electronics Europe GmbH (TEE) is the European electronic components business of Toshiba Electronic Devices and Storage Corporation. TEE offers European consumers and businesses a wide variety of innovative hard disk drive (HDD) products plus semiconductor solutions for automotive, industrial, IoT, motion control, telecoms, networking, consumer and white goods applications. The company’s broad portfolio encompasses integrated wireless ICs, power semiconductors, microcontrollers, optical semiconductors, ASSPs and discrete devices ranging from diodes to logic ICs. TEE has headquarters in Düsseldorf, Germany, with branch offices in Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom providing sales, marketing, and engineering. Company president is Mr. Tomoaki Kumagai.

   The Canvio Advance series of portable hard drives by Toshiba has been around for quite some time now which is why I need to point out that the model in my hands today is the updated (also refered to as V10, Backup 2.0 and/or Advance 2.5) version released last year which one can easily tell apart from its predecessor thanks to the new housing Toshiba used (textured finish instead of a polished/glossy one). This series is currently available in 1/2/4TB capacities, 4 different colors (black, red, green and light beige) and fully supports Toshiba's storage security and backup software suites. As for the drive in my hands under its textured enclosure Toshiba has placed their 7mm thick MQ04ABD200 SATA III 2.5" drive which features a rotational speed of 5400RPM together with 128MB of cache/buffer and an MTTF (mean time to failure) of 600.000 hours. Last but not least Toshiba covers the entire Canvio Advance line of portable hard drives with a 2 year limited warranty.

SPECIFICATIONS AND FEATURES

PACKAGING AND CONTENTS

The Canvio Advance arrived inside a small box that has a large product picture at the front, the company logo, supported software and the 2 year limited warranty.

On the left side of the box, we find the system requirements and bundle contents.

Both software suites by Toshiba are also mentioned on the right side.

Strangely enough at the rear of the box the two programs by Toshiba are mentioned again and this time in 10 languages.

Along with the Canvio Advance 2TB and its USB 3.2 Gen 1 cable you will also get a safety instructions and regulatory information paper.

THE CANVIO ADVANCE 2TB

With a size of 109mm in length, 78mm in width and 14mm in thickness/height the 149g heavy Canvio Advance is quite compact.

As usual to showcase size i placed the Canvio Advance 2TB right next to the Silicon Power PC60 Portable SSD, Netac Z7S Portable SSD, ADATA SE760 Portable SSD and the iStorage diskAshur 2 1TB Portable HDD.

On top of the textured enclosure, we find the company logo and the activity LED (white when in USB 2.0 mode and blue when in USB 3.2 Gen 1 mode).

The USB 3.2 Gen 1 host port is located on the right side of the enclosure (strangely enough Toshiba chose the older USB host port instead of USB-C).

A sticker with drive details/information is located at the base of the enclosure.

Here you can see the MQ04ABD200 drive placed inside the Canvio Advance 2TB (the 4TB variant has a different model inside).

STORAGE BACKUP & STORAGE SECURITY SOFTWARE

As mentioned, early Toshiba allows you to download their backup and encryption software directly from their website.

The backup software is very easy to use, just choose the drives and/or folders you’d like to backup and the frequency of the backups (automatic mode).

As for the security software you just need to set a password for the drive and you’re good to go (for the security feature to work all data on the drive have to be erased).

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 is repeated for a total of 6 times and after that the average (not peak) numbers are recorded into our charts. As always, every test was performed in a fresh installation of Microsoft Windows 10 Pro with every update installed up to the date of this review.

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

   The Canvio Advance (V10/Backup 2.0/2.5) series of USB 3.2 Gen 1 (USB 3.0/USB 3.1 Gen 1) portable hard drives belong in the high-end segment of Toshiba’s product lines and that’s also why we see the 2TB variant surpass its 4TB cousin form the “mid” level Canvio Ready line in quite a few tests. Still at the end of the day we’re talking about 2.5” portable hard drives so performance is as expected nowhere near to that of a portable SSD (regardless of type – 2.5” SATA or M.2 SATA/PCIe). On the other hand, however drives like the Canvio Advance do offer the best price/capacity ratio so if performance is not on top of your list, then this is the recommended way to go. Last but not least the addition of the storage backup and security software suites certainly add to the overall value of the drive and should be quite useful to both consumers and professionals alike.

   With a price tag currently set at just USD67.99 inside the USA (Amazon.com) and at 65.80Euros inside the EU (Amazon.de) the Canvio Advance 2TB USB 3.2 Gen 1 portable storage by Toshiba is priced extremely well. Overall, the Canvio Advanced 2TB ticks every single box I can think of. It’s compact (and thin), very fast (for a 2.5” portable HDD), runs cool, is available in 4 colors (black, red, green and light beige), comes with two very useful pieces of software and is very affordable. Yes, I would like to see a 5TB capacity variant available in that line but that’s obviously not enough of a reason for me to deny the Canvio Advance 2TB the Golden Award.

PROS

- Build Quality
- Compact Size (And Thin)
- Very Good Read & Write Performance
- Low Temperatures
- Available In 4 Colors (Black/Red/Green/Light Beige)
- Bundled Software (Backup & Security)
- Price (For Some)

CONS

- Only Up To 4TB