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Introduction
There are plenty of companies with portable hard drives on the market. These range from the heavy hitters in the storage segment, like Seagate and Western Digital, to brands less known in the segment. Verbatim is one such company from the latter group being known more for optical storage than they are for portable storage. Despite that, Verbatim has several entries in the portable storage market including the Titan XS 320GB portable hard drive.
About Verbatim
Packaging
The front of the packaging has a professional looking blue-white motif that puts the drive and USB cord on full display. It also mentions the Verbatim 7-Year Warranty as well as some of the software included on the drive. The coolest thing, however, is the small piece of rubber attached to the bottom-right of the box. This is made of the same protective rubber material that surrounds the hard drive, giving a nifty little preview before you commit to a purchase.
The rear of the packaging is less notable, mostly having the standard product features and requirements in a handful of languages as well as a small paragraph about the drive.
Introduction
There are plenty of companies with portable hard drives on the market. These range from the heavy hitters in the storage segment, like Seagate and Western Digital, to brands less known in the segment. Verbatim is one such company from the latter group being known more for optical storage than they are for portable storage. Despite that, Verbatim has several entries in the portable storage market including the Titan XS 320GB portable hard drive.
About Verbatim
Quote
Since its beginning in 1969, Verbatim has been at the forefront of the evolution in data storage technology. Today, more than 39 years later, Verbatim remains one of the most recognizable names in the data storage industry.
Customer-driven, Verbatim is known for adding considerable product value--above and beyond its competitors--to established media technology. As an industry pioneer, Verbatim is recognized for the role it plays in early product development and commercial product introduction of new technologies. Verbatim's leadership role is especially apparent in the evolution of optical media recording including MO and the CD/DVD family of products.
Along with its technological innovations, Verbatim has always been recognized universally for its superior manufacturing practices. Verbatim was the first media company to receive ISO certification, the de facto standard for quality management systems worldwide. This commitment to quality translates into consistent product performance and reliability. In addition, Verbatim provides toll-free technical support and service to enable its customers to maximize the performance of its products.
As a subsidiary of Mitsubishi Chemical Corporation, a recognized world leader in the chemical and computer industries, Verbatim is ideally positioned to take advantage of changes in the market while continuing to challenge the frontiers of data storage.
http://www.verbatim.com/about.cfm
Packaging
The front of the packaging has a professional looking blue-white motif that puts the drive and USB cord on full display. It also mentions the Verbatim 7-Year Warranty as well as some of the software included on the drive. The coolest thing, however, is the small piece of rubber attached to the bottom-right of the box. This is made of the same protective rubber material that surrounds the hard drive, giving a nifty little preview before you commit to a purchase.
The rear of the packaging is less notable, mostly having the standard product features and requirements in a handful of languages as well as a small paragraph about the drive.
Page 2
Marketing Summary
Package Contents
The package is housed in a standard 2-piece plastic shroud that doubles as the exterior window on the box. This is pretty much standard operating procedure for PC stuff of this type. Thankfully, Verbatim didn't decide to use blister packaging and instead simply have the two pieces hold together by crimps in the plastic.
Removing the contents from the packaging reveals the drive, the USB cord, and a pair of paper booklets. One of them is the instruction manual for the drive and the other is the pamphlet for the MP3 offer noted on the front of the packaging.
Specifications
Marketing Summary
Quote
The Verbatim Titan XS™, the industries smallest portable hard drive, lets you backup your laptop on-the-go! This rugged and sporty drive offers a shock-resistant rubber enclosure that protects against rough-and-tumble use. The Titan XS™ is compatible with all USB connections and includes Turbo USB software and Nero BackItUp & Burn Essentials software with full system backup and restore functions. The Titan XS™ is big on storage with 320GB, 500GB and 640GB capacities. The Titan XS™ boasts special bonuses from Norton Online Backup and eMusic as well as a 7-year limited warranty.
http://www.verbatim.com/products/detail.cfm?product_id=294D8DEC-1143-3415-5FCDC4B693662C8B&cat_id=9F80A6DB-1143-3415-5FBF29BD25561E51
Package Contents
The package is housed in a standard 2-piece plastic shroud that doubles as the exterior window on the box. This is pretty much standard operating procedure for PC stuff of this type. Thankfully, Verbatim didn't decide to use blister packaging and instead simply have the two pieces hold together by crimps in the plastic.
Removing the contents from the packaging reveals the drive, the USB cord, and a pair of paper booklets. One of them is the instruction manual for the drive and the other is the pamphlet for the MP3 offer noted on the front of the packaging.
Specifications
- Industries smallest hard drive
- Outfitted with a shock-resistant rubber casing
- Windows and Mac compatible
- Includes Nero BackItUp & Burn Essentials software*
- Backed by a 7-year limited warranty
- Bonus Norton Online Backup (5GB) and eMusic offer of 35 MP3s
- Storage capacities of 320GB, 500GB and 640GB
- Amazon Link
Page 3
Titan XS 320GB
The Titan XS portable drive appears to be a standard 2.5" laptop drive wrapped in 1/8" or so with the rubber protective sleeve, so it is roughly the size of a 2.5" drive plus 1/4" of an inch or so in each direction. Put another way, the drive is roughly the same size as an iPhone, but half again wider. The rubber sleeve itself seems like it would offer adequate enough protection for anything that the drive would face including a mild amount of shock resistance. The surface also allows the drive to be stable when placed on a flat surface, staying in place where you put it.
Use
The Titan XS is pretty straightforward to use. It came formatted to FAT32 out of the box, as is typical of external storage, and it included the Nero BackItUp & Burn Essentials software mentioned on the box in the drive. Even though this is the norm for packaged software, we at ASE Labs think that Verbatim should have included the software on some sort of optical media separate from the drive. Combined, the software only takes up 350MB, so they even could have included it on the CD if cost was that much of a concern.
The drive uses the more recent single USB cord for power and for connection. The connector itself looks like a standard Mini-B USB jack, and our tests with different cords confirms that the cord included with the drive is indeed a standard (though very short!) Mini-B connector. We applaud Verbatim sticking to standardization when other companies tend to stick proprietary connectors on their drives, and the ability to use any Mini-B USB cable with the Titan XS greatly extends the usability of the drive.
We also tested the drive with various electronic equipment. One thing that must be kept in mind for portable drives like the Titan XS is that the drive drawing power from the same USB jack as it does file operations from means it is less flexible than dedicated external hard drives and external enclosures. Any electronic device that you plug the drive into needs to be powered for the drive to function, so unpowered USB hubs and keyboard USB jacks that would work with typical flash drives and separately-powered external drives would be right out. With that said, the drive was compatible with everything it was tested on.
The drive was tested on a computer with Windows XP and a computer with Windows 7. It was also tested on a 4-USB PlayStation 3 system and a Netgear WNDR3700 wireless router. In all cases, the drive booted up and ran fine with no hiccups whatsoever. On Windows 7, it only took about 15 seconds or so for the drive to spool up and be ready for use. Windows XP took a bit longer, and it took a little over 30 seconds for the drive to be ready for use on the PS3 and the router.
Conclusion
Verbatim has another winner on their hands with the Titan XS. It offers a compact design with a flair for durability, and the included Nero software could be a great bonus for Windows users. At press time, the drive retails for about $66 (Amazon), which is pretty well in line with the rest of the market. While we would prefer that the software was included on separate media, that is by no means a deal-breaker for this drive. We at ASE Labs recommend the Verbatim Titan XS 320GB portable hard drive.
ASE Labs would like to thank Verbatim for making this review possible.
Titan XS 320GB
The Titan XS portable drive appears to be a standard 2.5" laptop drive wrapped in 1/8" or so with the rubber protective sleeve, so it is roughly the size of a 2.5" drive plus 1/4" of an inch or so in each direction. Put another way, the drive is roughly the same size as an iPhone, but half again wider. The rubber sleeve itself seems like it would offer adequate enough protection for anything that the drive would face including a mild amount of shock resistance. The surface also allows the drive to be stable when placed on a flat surface, staying in place where you put it.
Use
The Titan XS is pretty straightforward to use. It came formatted to FAT32 out of the box, as is typical of external storage, and it included the Nero BackItUp & Burn Essentials software mentioned on the box in the drive. Even though this is the norm for packaged software, we at ASE Labs think that Verbatim should have included the software on some sort of optical media separate from the drive. Combined, the software only takes up 350MB, so they even could have included it on the CD if cost was that much of a concern.
The drive uses the more recent single USB cord for power and for connection. The connector itself looks like a standard Mini-B USB jack, and our tests with different cords confirms that the cord included with the drive is indeed a standard (though very short!) Mini-B connector. We applaud Verbatim sticking to standardization when other companies tend to stick proprietary connectors on their drives, and the ability to use any Mini-B USB cable with the Titan XS greatly extends the usability of the drive.
We also tested the drive with various electronic equipment. One thing that must be kept in mind for portable drives like the Titan XS is that the drive drawing power from the same USB jack as it does file operations from means it is less flexible than dedicated external hard drives and external enclosures. Any electronic device that you plug the drive into needs to be powered for the drive to function, so unpowered USB hubs and keyboard USB jacks that would work with typical flash drives and separately-powered external drives would be right out. With that said, the drive was compatible with everything it was tested on.
The drive was tested on a computer with Windows XP and a computer with Windows 7. It was also tested on a 4-USB PlayStation 3 system and a Netgear WNDR3700 wireless router. In all cases, the drive booted up and ran fine with no hiccups whatsoever. On Windows 7, it only took about 15 seconds or so for the drive to spool up and be ready for use. Windows XP took a bit longer, and it took a little over 30 seconds for the drive to be ready for use on the PS3 and the router.
Conclusion
Verbatim has another winner on their hands with the Titan XS. It offers a compact design with a flair for durability, and the included Nero software could be a great bonus for Windows users. At press time, the drive retails for about $66 (Amazon), which is pretty well in line with the rest of the market. While we would prefer that the software was included on separate media, that is by no means a deal-breaker for this drive. We at ASE Labs recommend the Verbatim Titan XS 320GB portable hard drive.
ASE Labs would like to thank Verbatim for making this review possible.