FRONTPAGE Silicon Power Armor A66 USB 3.2 Gen1 2 TB Portable Hard Drive Review

[Overclockers.com]

Today we have an opportunity to share some information about an external hard drive. From cold storage and backups to a traveling drive, some users need the portability of such devices. And if you're anything like me, these drives can take some abuse during their travels which may require more protection than a simple plastic case. Silicon Power mitigates this risk in the Armor A66 by placing a HDD inside a military drop-test standard (MIL-STD-810G) and IPX4 water-resistant chassis. We've got 2 TB black and yellow version, but there are different colors to choose from and capacities reach up to 5 TB. We'll take a look at the heavy-duty construction of the A66, highlight the durable features, and help you determine if it will suit your demanding needs.

Click here to read more!

 

[MaddMutt]

From reading the article : The use of a 5400rpm hdd was to keep cost down. Do they have plans to use 7200rpm hdd or a ssd? IIRC a ssd would have a max transfer at 550mb. Can you take the product apart to manually upgrade it?

Thank You for a Great Review

 

[EarthDog]

Heh.. I thought we took it apart in the review...yes I edited it too. Lol.

We need to see inside. Sometimes there's proprietary or soldered on interfaces so you just can't drop any 2.5" drive.

 

[Blaylock]

I'm not aware of any plans for silicon power to upgrade to a 7200 RPM. I did take the drive apart and the drive can be replaced. The PCB at the base looks to be a std SATA power/data connector while the other side is the USB 3.2 Gen1. The dive is taped to the back plastic panel with some fairly decent dbl sided tape. In trying to remove it it was destroying the tape so I stopped. Upgrading the drive is outside of the realm of the review so I left it at that. Just a review of the product.

If you are interested I can post a couple pics of it here when I get a free minute, but everyone pretty much knows what a 2.5" hdd looks like.

 

[Woomack]

@MaddMutt
These products use cheaper HDD which are still not much slower than the 7200RPM. This is HDD, you can't make miracles going from 5400 to 7200 RPM and I don't think anyone cares if it's 10% faster or slower when it's for a data copy and you won't really work directly on these drives. No matter what HDD you install inside, it won't be even close to the slowest SSD on the market right now.
External SSDs are a different product line. External 3.5" HDDs are also a different product line. It's not hard to check their products on the official website - https://www.silicon-power.com/web/category/PortableSSDs ... as I said, it's a different product line designed for different purposes. There are also external enclosures if you want to use your own SSD instead of HDD ... and surprise, it's also a different product category

 

[Blaylock]

100% agree Woomack.

If you are looking for an external SSD or need higher transfer speeds than the A66 maybe consider Silicon Power's PC60. It's an SSD with USB 3.2 Gen2 Type-C connector and capacities range from 240 GB up to 1.9 TB. Naturally, it will be more expensive (i.e. the 1TB is $154 vs. $45).

 

[Blaylock]

BONUS MATERIAL!

Below are some additional pictures of the internal components and how it is built.