Fantom Drives Extreme 2TB External SSD - 2800MB/s, Thunderbolt 3 and 4, USB Type-C, Aluminum, 3D NAND TLC, TB3X-2300N2TB

Fantom offered the exact same drive, with 2-day shipping, for a total of $424.00. The price was based on a 10% off sale (of which they seem to have on a frequent basis). Hence, I bought the 2TB eXtreme Pro Thunderbolt 3 drives directly from the vendor. For those who absolutely must have Seagate or WD drives, realize that each 2TB drive (I purchased two) has the PNY brand Gen 4 XLR8 CS3040 M.2 NVMe 2TB SSD drive, which has been reviewed by PC Magazine as being not only significantly faster than the aforementioned TB 3 SSDs, but are rated for 2-million hours (MTBF); that’s 500,000 hours more than most. Like other similar drives, it has the same 5-year warranty. I once fell into the “It’s gotta be a Seagate or WD SSD!” camp, and only bought LaCie drives. I changed my mind after researching Internet sites and watching a number of YouTube videos that declared the PNY CS3040 to have superior throughput in comparison to the popular LaCie model and others, based on its excellent on-board controller. Reviews are one thing, but real-life tests are another: I was surprised to find that the Fantom drives had faster Read/Write numbers than the internal Seagate in my LaCie. The LaCie Ruuged TB3 SSD was almost as fast in the Read mode, but was noticeably slower in the Write mode(?). The Fantoms are faster than the internal Seagate M.2 NVMe SSD in my mid 2020 iMac i9 27-inch 5K 72GB RAM | 5700XT(16GB) GPU. While some might consider it a downside, I actually appreciate the heft and somewhat larger build of these portable drives. Location video shoots can be rough on equipment. These drives get warm, as expected, but thanks to the solid aluminum chassis with recessed heat sink ”fins,” they do not get near as hot as the USB C half-speed (1050 MB/s) drives I used to use on my video camera. Perhaps that’s why they last for 2-million hours. Did I mention that the Torrance, California built 2TB Fantom drive costs less than its portable LaCie and SanDisk/G-Drive counterparts? (Note: the 1 TB version of the same drive uses the ubiquitous WD M.2 NVMe 1TB SSD drive).

Wow - this fast SSD gave me a brand new 2017 iMac. Cant believe I waited to do this.

The case itself is the issue, at first I though the whole thing was messed up because every time I put my ps5 in sleep mode and turn it back on I would have to repair the drive like I unplugged it every time, so I returned it in exchange for another, and this second one did the same thing. Just so you know, none of my other external drives have this problem, so instead of sending it back, I opened it up and took the inner Nvme out and put it into a spare Nvme enclosure I had and it worked, haven’t had a problem since, the inner workings of the enclosure are faulty, I couldn’t say what it is I just know the enclosure is the issue, would not recommend for gaming on consoles, I would just recommend buying an Nvme and an enclosure yourself and put them together, there’s tool less ones out there. As for me, I’ll keep this one in the new case and cut my losses, very disappointing to say the least

Solid construction. Cant go wrong with a WD Black SN750 wrapped in a solid well built aluminum case. Fast! Comes very close to its claimed speed of up to 2800 mbps. If you have a Thunderbolt 3 port pay the extra $100 or so more. Its so worth it. Had a WD My Passport SSD and it couldnt even come close to its advertised speed of 1050 mbps.

After using this for a few weeks now, Im thoroughly impressed by the speed of the drive. I do large vector illustrations(work) and 3d animation(hobby) and its way faster for me to work directly on the extreme from FD than it is to work on the Mac itself. Fits perfectly into my desk set up and also good because I can carry it around when Im on my macbook pro. The listing mentions the quality of the build. When I received it, I could definitely feel the quality in my hands from the first time. Hands down would recommend any mac users looking exclusively for mac ssds. Ive added crystal disk results from my pc with thunderbolt 3 port and black magic results with my mac. i got better than advertised speed with the crystal disk surprisingly. I get it, this is pretty expensive, as is any new technology for that matter. However, when comparing the quality and price of other Thunderbolt 3 nvme ssds, its cheaper and better quality. The performance seems to be more consistent and better as well. First time getting fantom drives but if their other products are as good as this, they got themselves a loyal customer. Im kind of glad i clicked on a social media ad for once.

I bought this compact SSD for use as the Time Machine backup drive for my 2021 M1Max MacBook Pro laptop/notebook computer. I have only used it three times so far, but it seems to work great; definitely a lot faster than the external hard drive that I had been using for the same purpose previously. This SSD is roughly the same size as a deck of playing cards, but surprisingly heavy for its small size. Naturally, I wish it cost a hundred dollars less, but so far I am quite pleased with it. It is worth noting the Thunderbolt cable that comes with this SSD is quite short, so it works fine if you will only place the SSD on a desk or table right next to your computer, but otherwise you would want to get a high-quality Thunderbolt cable with more length.

It is fast access and fast write. My last SSD had a severe pause when I accessed it. This one doesnt. I use it for ArcGIS drone orthophotos.

This is insane fast. If you handle large files or many files daily, then this is a no brainer.

Love it, o ya issue is the cord is magnetic and sometimes disconnects when I move my laptop

I bought this product to use during an upgrade from MacOs High Sierra to Monterey, but unfortunately the Thunderbolt firmware on High Sierra was too old. It could recognise the drive on the Thunderbolt bus, but couldnt mount the disk. Once I had upgraded to Monterey the disk worked perfectly!