By using a Thunderbolt 3 connection, Glyph doubles the speed of the fastest USB external drives
Glyph Production Storage is a New York based business that describes itself as a digital data storage company, although its product range contains more than storage devices. It focuses on high-quality solutions that are assembled in the USA, using technologies that are standard for most Apple Macs and PC workstations. Over the past year, we’ve seen a slew of affordable external drives that use NVMe NAND modules inside for maximum performance. Most of these use the USB 3.2 Gen 2 interface to enable speeds of up to 1,000Mb/s to be achieved. But it is possible to go quicker than that using Thunderbolt 3 connections. The new Glyph Atom Pro SSD does exactly that, promising to make the USB connected drives look like they’re stuck in the slow lane. Is it as rapid as Glyph promises, and is that extra speed worth the cost difference to a USB solution? Glyph isn’t a business looking to stack them high and sell them cheap, so the relatively high pricing of the Glyph Atom Pro series won’t surprise those who are familiar with its products. The Atom Pro is manufactured in three capacities: 500GB,1TB and 2TB. Glyph doesn’t sell them directly but through a global reseller channel, making exact pricing difficult to pin down for any region. At the time of writing the US costs on Amazon are $249.95, $399.95 and $699.95 respectively. And, in the UK those costs translate to £265.00, £388.06 and £805.89. Calculating the cost per GB, the larger capacities offer the best deal, in general. These costs are very much in line with the comparable G-Technology G-DRIVE mobile Pro, but more expensive than the Sabrent ROCKET XTRM and Plugable Thunderbolt 3 External SSD. And, we’re not talking a small difference, Plugable offers its 2TB drive for a little more than the 1TB version of the Atom Pro, and Sabrent has a 4TB model at Glyph’s 2TB pricing. We’re sure that Glyph would argue that the Atom Pro is better engineered and comes with a superior warranty. But in terms of pure value for money, the Glyph Atom Pro wouldn’t be our first choice. The size of many NVMe-based external drives is restricted by the internal electronics since most of these are made using the M.2 2280 form factor. But the Atom is about the same size as the classic WD My Passport, or rather it is when cocooned inside its rubberised protective bumper. While we appreciate that this cover does afford significant protection from drops, it also obscures the more elegant form of the Atom Pro held inside. If you want to see the drive undressed, so to speak, getting it out isn’t that easy an exercise, but it’s a doddle compared with the reverse procedure. Other than the physical protection that the cover provides it is also the temporary home of the short Type-C cable that slots into a grove around the outside.
