14 DAY TRIAL // We've seen our share of rugged computers, computers parts and consumer electronics, and, while the new hard disk drive from Silicon Power isn't the toughest thing in history, it can go through a lot without suffering crippling damage.
The new product is called Armor A60 and is an external, portable hard disk drive unit featuring an “extra rugged” outer enclosure.
A hard outer casing isn't really enough to ensure the survivability of an HDD, though. After all, the thing has moving parts that can be jarred by bumps, drops and other shocks.
Fortunately, there are such things as specialized internal HDD suspension systems, which will bleed off inertia in such situations.
So, while there are limits to how much abuse the Armor A60 can take, they are significantly higher than for normal portable storage devices.
The HDD was proven capable of shrugging off US military drop-test standards MIL-STD 810G Method 516.6 Procedure IV (transit drop test), including specific height free-fall test (122 cm).
Furthermore, the drive has been shown to be water-resistant. Not enough to survive being submerged to any sort of depth, but sufficient to make it through a rainfall or water spray. Same goes for dust.
That's about it for the endurance section, though prospective customers will be glad to know that Silicon Power didn't gloss over the matters of utility and ease of use.
The USB 3.0 cable, for example, can be stored on the edge of the HDD and is, of course, backwards compatible with USB 2.0.
You'll be forced to cope with a speed of 480 Mbps in those cases, though. Sure, HDDs can't really make the best of that 5 Gbps potential speed of USB 3.0, but they can still go a lot faster than on 2.0 when allowed.
Alas, there are plenty of PCs and electronics devices and equipment that don't have USB 3.0, or enough of them to go around. Especially in the field.
As for the rest of the technical specifications, we're looking at 500 GB, 1 TB and 2 TB capacity options with DC5V power supply, all encased in a plastic/rubber enclosure.
The operating temperature is of 5℃ to 55℃ / 41ºF to 131ºF but you can store the thing in rooms with -40℃ to 70℃ / -41ºF to 158ºF. Finally, the Armor A60 Silicon Power HDD ships with a 3-year warranty and is compatible with Windows 8/7/Vista/XP/2000, Linux 2.6.31 or later, and Mac OS 10.5 or later operating systems. A 60-day trial version of NIS (Norton Internet Security) ships with every drive. Alas, prices are still unknown.