The Fastest External Drive for Video Editing Is...

Two of the fastest external storage drives in the market currently are the Samsung T3 USB3 SSD and the Transcend Storejet Thunderbolt SSD.

There are many brands and models of external SSDs out there but I mention the two Transcend and Samsung drives above is because they are small, portable and do not require any additional power (they are powered by the transfer cable). If you go for larger SSDs, or those with multiple slots for storage, they are usually bigger and often need to be powered (more cables).

I had recently bought a 1TB Transcend Storejet Thunderbolt SSD to expand the storage of Mac Pro (2013) which only has 512GB of storage.

I was blown away by the speed. It's as fast as the internal drive. Because my Mac Pro storage is smaller, I transferred Mac OS and all the applications to the Storejet and used that as the boot drive (and turned the Mac Pro internal as a backup). I noticed no difference in startup times or to my workflow which consist of photo and video editing. In Final Cut Pro, there were no dropped frames with 4K videos. Everything is snappy including launching of applications, gaming or loading of huge Photoshop files. In short, The Storejet Thunderbolt SSD is amazing.

Using the external drive as a boot drive is also great from a backup point of view. Just this year, I had to send my Mac Pro for servicing a few times. Now that my OS and applications are on the external drive, I can plug it into another Mac and boot from them and continue with work without any downtime (it took days to get the Mac Pro repaired -- thank goodness for AppleCare).

With the Transcend Storejet, I'm looking at 390MB/s writes and 300MB/s reads.

Downside of the Transcend Storejet is actually the Thunderbolt port on the unit. Because of the way it's designed, the cable cannot be plugged in deep into the port. So if you accidentally wiggle the cable, there's a good chance it will disconnect the drive. So do be careful not to move the Storejet after you've plugged it in.

In addition to Thunderbolt connection, there's also USB 3 and the cable is provided.

The physical size of the Storejet is quite close to a 6-inch smartphone and it comes with a soft slip-in case.

The Storejet is expensive, and that's the cause of my buyer's remorse...

My buyer's remorse

After using the Storejet for more than a month, I discovered that there's a more economical alternative in the Samsung T3 USB3.1 SSD.

If you looked at the price listed in the two ads above, you can see just how much savings you can get if you go for the Samsung instead of the Transcend. HUGE SAVINGS. If I know that in advanced, I would have bought the Samsung T3 SSD instead.

Reviews on Amazon for the Samsung T3 are posting speeds of 390MB/s reads and 400MB/s writes, which are both faster than the Transcend Storejet. Users have also said that the Samsung T3 has no problem with video editing.

The Samsung T3 provides a USB 3.1 Type C to Type A (rectangular) cable. Unfortunately, there's no Type C to C cable included but that should not be a problem because most devices nowadays are still using the ubiquitous Type A USB ports.

The Samsung T3 is quite small, around the half the size of a 6-inch smartphone. If you look at the photo above, check out the size of the USB port compared to the drive itself. It's so small that if it's thin enough, it can fit into a wallet.

My recommendation

Knowing what I know now, I would definitely recommend the Samsung T3 over the Transcend Thunderbolt Storejet. Both are fast but the Samsung is significantly cheaper so the price-value ratio is hugely in its flavor. Are there any scenarios where I would recommend the Storejet? Perhaps if you want to use a Thunderbolt port and free up a USB port. Other than that, I can't think of any, especially when the Thunderbolt connection doesn't offer any speed advantage to the USB 3 when using it for work.