Transcend StoreJet 25M3 Review [2018]

While storage technology may be evolving pretty fast, most people just want a reliable hard drive to store their data for a long time – a drive that will survive accidental drops and constant moving over the years. This is what Transcend’s StoreJet 25M3 does best as it delivers decent capacity for your data, complemented by a super-sturdy case to keep that data safe.

Since this is a drive that has had a lot of praise over its couple years of existence, we decided to take a closer look at what has made this drive so popular among customers in our short review of Transcend StoreJet 25M3.

Specs

 

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A Quick Rundown of Product Features

Primarily, the biggest feature that you would want with this product is its military-grade shock-resistance. For the past few years, Transcend has been focusing on how to make their hard drives super-sturdy and the StoreJet is the fruit of their labor since it has passed military-grade drop tests (MIL-STD-810G 516.6 standards).

Also, it has two additional functions: one-touch quick reconnect and one-touch auto-backup buttons, which allow you to instantly create backups by just pressing the button on the hard drive. To do this you will have to use the Transcend Elite data manager program that has a couple more functions for data management that are discussed further.

In case you want to reconnect the hard drive back to your computer, all you need to do is press the one-touch quick reconnect button. You do not need to unplug and plug the USB cables back to your PC or hard drive, which extends the lifespan of the ports and cable a lot. It is also a good way to prevent data corruption caused by faulty cables.

 

Design

It has a 3-stage advanced shock protection, which makes it capable of withstanding your weight in case you accidentally sit on it or if it falls from your table since it has a suspension damper inside it. It is covered with a hard casing to help prevent damage to the hard disk drive with an anti-slip rubber enclosure making sure you don’t drop it in the first place.

Aside from protection, the drive has a nice design with the backup/reconnect button placed in the corner.

Performance and alternatives

It is compatible with USB 3.0 and USB 2.0 (the cable has two USB connectors on one end – one for data, the other for power), which at the time of this drive’s release was pretty advanced. However, as this is just an HDD, it will probably not reach the higher data transfer speeds of USB 2.0 in most situations, let alone USB 3.0.

As for the actual speeds of this specific drive, the few benchmarks that have been taken show write and read speeds of around 100MB/s. As this is an older HDD, it will definitely not be the fastest drive out there but will perform well enough for most people’s needs, especially considering the high focus on other features, such as capacity and durability over file loading speeds. So if you’re looking for a fast drive, you should probably look at SSDs as they deliver much higher transfer speeds.

 

When compared to two similarly sturdy external hard drives – LaCie Mini and Silicon Power Rugged Armor A60, the StoreJet is a bit more compact and lightweight than the other two. While both LaCie and Armor provide larger capacities, the price per storage space is roughly the same for both A60 and StoreJet, with LaCie being much more expensive at the time of making this article (April 28, 2017).

As for speed, since these are all 5400RPM drives, the max speed will be around 110MB/s, with all three drives achieving said speeds and then some. Overall, if 2TB is enough storage for you and you aren’t planning on bringing your hard drive to a construction site anytime soon, the StoreJet remains the best option among its closest competitors.

 

Software

The hard drive comes with a free software application called the Transcend Elite. Its primary function is to allow the management of the hard drive as the application enables the one-touch auto-backup feature of the hard drive as well as data compression for it.

In addition, the Transcend Elite can enable the 256-bit AES encryption for files and folders inside the drive. It means that you can secure all your data in the drive using a password or passphrase. The Transcend Elite software can also be used to transfer your files from your Google Drive account directly to your Transcend hard drive.

Aside from that, you will be able to download the RecoverRx from Transcend. RecoverRx can help you recover files that you accidentally deleted or files from an accidentally formatted hard drive. The file type does not matter as long as the data is not completely destroyed or wiped out from the hard disk.

And in case that your computer does not have drivers for the hard drive, you can just get it online at this page. You can find and download the Transcend Elite, drivers, manuals (PDF version), and other utility programs for your hard drive from their web page.

 

What’s In The Box

Of course, you will get your Transcend StoreJet 25M3 hard disk drive with the enclosure. The hard drive comes with different storage sizes: 500GB, 1TB, and 2TB. You can choose from three colors: Iron Gray, Baby Blue or Military Green.

Aside from the external hard drive, you will also get a quick start guide, a USB cable, and your warranty card. Transcend’s StoreJet comes with a 3-year warranty, which is described in detail in Transcend’s warranty description.

 

What Do Others Think?

Overall, almost all customers who purchased the product haven’t had any problems with StoreJet 25M3. They primarily remark on three things about the product: it is durable, lightweight, and pretty fast for such a drive. Most of them use the product as their primary data storage when traveling and as a secondary data backup medium.

On the other hand, regarding negative feedback, the product does not receive a lot of those. Most of the detractors in other reviews complain about Transcend’s support team. According to them, the customer support team are slow to respond, impersonal, and ineffective.

 

Verdict

There is a reason that this product has been receiving a lot of praise online and offline. It is almost universally fit for most external hard drive users as it delivers high data capacity coupled with extreme durability. Even if you take out the safety features and the additional software applications, the hard drive on its own can pull its own weight.

StoreJet is the perfect travel companion for the regular data-dependent individual as well as a professional. With its durability alone, it can be sold easily. After all, the primary issue with other external hard drives in the market is their resistance to shock. Plus, hard disks were not designed to be moved around so an external one built primarily to endure such stress is a bargain.